Borderline
by BananaBirdNova
Summary: By Nova. For as long as he could remember, Jazz knew that something was wrong with him. When the insanity drove him to the edge of hope, it took the patience of the greatest tactician on Cybertron to change his mind. This snowballed out of a conversation with Bananabird. The conversation was a lot more fun than this story. Rated T for drug references and suicide ideology.
1. Where Worlds Meet

It was a little-known fact about Jazz, and one that he was careful to keep that way. The list of people (or groups) who did know was short enough that Jazz could count them on one hand. The medical staff knew, because it was part of his psych evaluation, but they were under ten or so confidentiality oaths, and Jazz knew Ratchet would do his best to keep them and be certain that everybody else did, too. Rung knew, obviously, since the psychologist had done his psych evaluation in the first place. Most, if not all, of the special operations division were in various levels of suspicion ranging from almost certain to mildly curious, but he knew his 'Bots, so they made the list even if they didn't _know_. Optimus knew. But the Prime barely counted toward the list because he was Optimus and if Jazz knew one thing, it was that Optimus Prime could be trusted.

Prowl was his baseline. Prowl was at the bottom of the list, almost an afterthought, even though the Praxian had known longer than anybody else on it, because if Jazz knew Optimus Prime could be trusted—who had known only a scant handful of vorns and then only when the saboteur already had a handle on it—then Prowl could undeniably be trusted without a doubt.

Everybody else was either oblivious to Jazz's secret, or only very mildly suspicious. Most of the time it could easily be written off as work issues. Being head of special operations was a very demanding job, after all, and most people could imagine that excuse for him, even if they couldn't comprehend the depth of it, or the way it wreaked havoc with Jazz's problem.

Prowl did, though.

 _~0~_

 _Jazz dropped down from the vent, ramming his knife through the Decepticon's helm, and the mech dropped like a rock. Mirage was just as silent and efficient, taking out the second guard. By the time the invisible spy moved to start hacking the door controls, Jazz was at Prowl's side, skimming over the damage to patch the most critical injuries and get the tactician on his feet. The damage was extensive, most of it purely malicious. It was no surprise when Prowl came online suddenly, moving to strike with the swiftness of a Circuit Su master. Jazz took some of the blow, deflecting most of it and skipping back a step to avoid the follow up, calling the mech's name quietly._

 _Prowl shuddered, collapsing as his injuries and malnourishment caught up to him, and Jazz was back at his side in an instant. He finished the quick repairs, offering a cube of energon, and the mech drained it in seconds._

" _Tell me who did this, Prowl." The saboteur demanded quietly._

 _Prowl looked up to meet his gaze, one optic flickering, on the verge of going out entirely. "No." he said simply, and then started getting to his feet. Jazz pulled him back down, armor flaring, a low growl growing in his engine._

" _Prowl," he warned._

" _The others?" Prowl asked, deflecting the question._

" _Bee an' Trip've got 'em. Tell me who did this to you."_

 _Prowl met his gaze again, unyielding._

" _Jazz, we need to go." Mirage whispered. Jazz didn't so much as twitch. The growl was still vibrating through his chassis._

 _Prowl reached out to touch his shoulder with the half of his hand he still had. "No, Jazz." He repeated firmly._

 _Jazz's visor flicked off, and he rubbed at it as he turned his head away. After a moment, he let out a warm vent and lowered his helm a bit. The growl died out and his armor flattened. Then he onlined his visor and hauled his friend up, hurrying him through the door. He had more important things to focus on right now._

 _Maybe later he would follow up._

~0~

"Tell me how you've been doing, Jazz." Rung asked in his soft, patient way.

Jazz sighed deeply, staring off at the wall for a long moment. "'S gettin' worse. Everythin' is, Rung. 'S gettin' too much like it was before…back when I was on th'streets." The saboteur's face twisted suddenly. "Fragging war." He spat. "We were s'possed t'be stoppin' stuff like that, y'know. But far's I can tell, we're only makin' it worse. Fragging 'Cons."

Jazz was on his feet before he knew it, pacing across the office agitatedly. Usually, Rung would either wait for him to calm down or change the subject.

"Jazz, stop." The psychiatrist said firmly instead. The cadence of the words was distinctly out of character for him, but far from unfamiliar.

Jazz's gaze snapped to the other mech, visor flashing. "What did you say?" he demanded quietly, pointing his knife at the non-combatant.

Rung lifted his hands calmingly, his smile apologetic and nervous. "Sorry, Jazz. That seems to work oddly well for Prowl, I thought—"

"Yeah, it does, for Prowl. Ya aint Prowl, Rung. An' ya oughta remember that." The saboteur growled, keeping the mech pinned with his glare and raised knife.

Rung lowered his helm a bit. "I will. I am sorry, Jazz. Please, have a seat."

A low growl rose out of the head of special operation's engine, his armor flaring slightly, and then he turned for the door. "I'm leaving." He muttered.

He took one step out of Rung's office.

"Jazz, go back in there and finish your session."

Jazz turned on the tactician with a snarl. "You fragging planned this, you glitch!" he accused.

"Hardly." Prowl glanced up from his datapad. "Rung merely made an observation and suggested trying to mimic the interaction. I did warn him that it probably wouldn't work, but I saw no harm in letting him try."

"I nearly took his head off, Prowl!" Jazz protested, and then suddenly slumped, armor flattening and visor dimming. "I'm getting worse, mech." He admitted quietly. "I'm slipping, an' I don't understand why I can't stop it."

Prowl reached out to put a hand on the mech's shoulder, smiling a bit. "Go talk to Rung about it."

Jazz sighed quietly, nodding, and turned back. "Sorry 'bout that, Rung." He apologized, dropping back into the visitor's seat.

"It's no problem, friend." Rung smiled, hiding his relief. "You say you feel that you're getting worse. Care to elaborate?"

The saboteur shrugged. "It's frustratin'. I know it's happening. I used t'be able t'stop m'self from swingin' so much. For a while there I was almost… normal."

"Before the war started," Rung supplied.

Jazz nodded, pursing his lips. "B'fore I got back inta th'business of killin' people."

 _~0~_

 _Prowl carefully pulled the smaller Polyhexian into a sitting position, propping him up against the wall. He cast a scan over the mech, inspecting the chemical residues in the vials scattered across the ground. Most were various sedatives or narcotic analgesics, but a few seemed to be mixtures that Prowl couldn't readily identify. He sighed deeply._

" _I thought we agreed you weren't going to do this anymore."_

 _A shiver ran through Jazz, and his visor flickered before he lifted his helm, blinking up at him. "Prowl?" he murmured, though his voice was distant and filled with static._

 _The Praxian smirked. "Who else?" Jazz flinched, letting his head drop again. Prowl put a hand on his shoulder. "Tell me why, Jazz." He demanded, though gently._

 _After a long moment, the saboteur reached over to grab something and lifted it for Prowl to see. "Somethin' else I promised I wouldn' do again," he whispered._

 _The knife was covered in energon. Not Jazz's, Prowl could tell. Someone else's. He'd killed someone._

 _The tactician took the knife from his shaking hand and tossed it into subspace. "Who did you save?" he asked._

 _Jazz moved his mouth for a moment before he managed to get words to come out. "N-nobody. I didn' save… he was jus'… in my way." He admitted, the last words barely audible._

" _Who did you save?" Prowl asked again._

 _Jazz snarled, shoving the other mech away. "Nobody! It wasn't like that this time, Prowl, I just… I just_ could _so I… I killed th'fraggin' 'Con an' it didn' even_ mean _anythin' I jus'…" a desperate keen grew up under the growl in his engine, his vents fighting to keep up with his emotional distress._

 _Prowl sent another scan over his friend, frowning a bit. He shook the mech's shoulder to get his attention, and sighed when Jazz's frightened, flickering gaze turned up to his. "Jazz, you need to get help for this."_

 _The saboteur's face twisted in anger. "I don' need a damn shrink ta tell me what I already know." He snapped, grabbing one of the glass vials from the ground and lifting his arm to throw it. Prowl caught his wrist._

" _Stop it." He ordered firmly. Jazz promptly went limp, dropping the vial. "I've done everything I can to help you, Jazz." The Praxian told him quietly. "And clearly it's not enough. If you're going to survive this war, you_ need _to talk to someone who knows how to properly treat this sort of thing."_

 _Prowl sighed again when Jazz didn't answer and his visor flickered out. He started to get to his feet, and paused when the mech grabbed his arm._

" _Don'… don' leave me here alone." Jazz whispered._

 _The tactician knelt back down, putting a comforting hand on his friend's helm. "Have I ever before?"_

" _No."_

" _Then I'm not going to start now."_

 _Prowl stood up, Jazz's hand fell back to his lap, and the Praxian went about cleaning up the mess the Polyhexian had made. He returned after a breem to sling one of the saboteur's arms over his shoulder and hauled him to his feet._

" _Guess… it couldn't hurt… jus' t'try…" Jazz muttered on the way back to base._

 _Prowl smiled a bit. "I know a mech. He comes highly recommended. I'll contact him once we get home."_

 _Jazz sighed as he tried to get his legs to hold his own weight. "Thanks, Prowl."_

" _Of course, Jazz."_

 _~0~_

"Is that the only thing you feel is triggering it?" Rung asked.

Jazz sat back, thinking. "It feels like th'streets again." He murmured.

"How so?"

The saboteur frowned. "It was always so… senseless. It never _meant_ anythin'. It was always 'optic for optic' with us an' I can't help but feel like we're gettin' into that here, that we're slippin' into that. Like we're just two rival street gangs fightin' for territory when we're supposed to be _more_ than that, Rung, we're s'possed t'be puttin' an _end_ t'that sort of thing, not… not scaling it up." Jazz sighed, reaching up to rub at his helm. "It's what th'whole war's about, isn't it? Makin' sure people like me stop happening?"

"Making sure _circumstances_ like yours stop happening." Rung corrected softly.

"Yeah. Circumstances." Jazz murmured.

 _~0~_

 _Prowl was sitting at the table with a datapad projecting the morning news above it when Jazz got home. He could tell the mech was brooding deeply about something, so he grabbed a cube of energon and dropped into the other seat, glancing over the news report as he took a sip. Then he did a double-take, setting the cube down and turning the hologram to get a better look. Prowl didn't even seem to notice, staring off at the far wall without seeing it._

' _ **83% of armed forces side with Decepticon uprising, tension rises between Council members and Prime'**_ _the headline read._

" _No kiddin', eh?" Jazz murmured as he skimmed the report. "That ain't good." He glanced at Prowl and the untouched cube of energon at his elbow. "Prowl?" he waved a hand in the Praxian's face, frowning when he didn't get so much as a doorwing twitch out of him. "Prowl." He repeated, shaking his shoulder._

 _Prowl blinked, optics refreshing and focusing. "The Autobots will not last longer than a decavorn, at current projections." He said. "They do not have the mechpower nor the expertise to combat Megatron."_

" _I hope ya didn' need your tactical computer ta tell ya that." Jazz quipped, scrolling down to look at the statistics on the article. "He's got almost th'whole army t'back 'im. Looks pretty cut an' dry, t'me."_

" _Indeed." Prowl murmured, sinking back into his brooding._

 _Jazz sat back, taking another sip of energon. "I know that look. What'cha thinkin', Prowler?"_

 _Prowl didn't respond for a long moment, but Jazz knew he'd heard the question, so he only waited patiently. The answer, when it came, was entirely unexpected._

" _I'm going to enlist with the Autobots as a tactician."_

 _Jazz nearly choked on his energon, and he quickly set it down, turning to his friend. "What now?"_

 _Prowl nodded, meeting his gaze firmly. "They need a qualified tactical advisor."_

" _Didn' you just get done sayin' they weren't gonna last more'n a decavorn?"_

" _At current projections." The mech agreed._

 _Jazz lifted an optic ridge. "An' you change that outlook how much?"_

" _Significantly." Prowl reached out to take his datapad back, shutting off the projector and starting to work on it._

" _How significantly?" the Polyhexian asked suspiciously._

" _Significantly enough."_

" _Prowl."_

 _The Praxian huffed, doorwings twitching back. "I double their projected lifespan."_

 _Jazz stared. "To a whole two decavorns. Wow." When Prowl only continued to work, Jazz frowned. "I don' get it. If they're gonna lose, why sign up with 'em at all? Seems like ya might be better off with th'Decepticons."_

 _The Enforcer looked up, regarding him for a long moment. "Perhaps. From a logical standpoint, yes." He murmured, looking distant for a moment. Then he focused on Jazz again. "But if the Prime does not believe they are correct and insists on resisting them, then I believe it would be best to follow suit. It's the right thing to do, Jazz."_

 _Prowl went back to his work and Jazz slowly finished his energon, thinking hard. "When ya goin'?" he asked after several long breems of silence._

 _Prowl finished what he was doing and flipped his pad into subspace. "Right now."_

 _The Praxian froze when a low growl rose out of Jazz's engine, meeting his visored glare. "A joor of warning's all I get? Seriously?"_

 _Prowl angled his doorwings apologetically. "Not intentionally. The situation changed dramatically overnight, Jazz. I don't think I should wait any longer." When Jazz only continued to glare, Prowl sighed, putting a hand on his friend's shoulder. "I'll be back." He promised, and then left._

 _Jazz slumped onto the table, the growl dying. He stared at his empty energon cube, fighting back the intense, conflicting emotions warring in his spark. Then he glanced over at the full cube of energon Prowl had left behind and sighed. "Glitch." He muttered as he stood up and subspaced the cube. "Glitching Enforcer. Fraggit." He growled to himself as he left the apartment._

 _/What happens t'those projections of yours if I come with ya?/_

 _There was surprised silence on the comm for a long moment._

 _/A significant increase./ Prowl finally responded. /But you don't have to, Jazz./_

 _/Yeah, I know./ the ex-convict pulled up next to the Enforcer, seeming to glide through the morning traffic. /But if ya say it's the right thing t'do, then I'm right behind ya, Prowler./_

 _/Thank you, Jazz./_

 _Jazz was surprised when they left Praxus entirely, getting on the freeway to Iacon, but it made sense. If Prowl felt this was as urgent as he seemed to, then they'd want to go straight to the spark of Autobot power. He idly skimmed around the other travelers, constructing his termination notice for work, but then hesitating when it came time to submit it. He sidled up next to Prowl again._

 _/Y'let th'High Enforcers know you're quittin' yet?/ he asked._

 _/As of a joor ago./_

 _Jazz snickered. /Fielded any panicked comms yet?/_

 _/Only a disappointed one from Intrepid, but Smokescreen should only be getting to work in the next few breems./ Prowl answered, amusement in his voice. /I expect, once Intrepid breaks the news to the tactical department, that I will have to explain myself several more times./_

 _/Yeah, no kiddin',/ the mech chuckled, and then fell silent. He dodged around Prowl, coming up on his other side._

 _/Jazz?/ the Praxian prompted._

 _/Y'think they'll take me?/ he asked quietly, sounding very small. /This ain't gonna be like th'security firm, Prowl./_

 _/No, it won't./ Prowl agreed. There was a long breem of thoughtful silence._

 _/Well?/ Jazz asked._

 _/I don't know. There are too many unknown variables at the moment. We shall have to wait and see how it goes./_

 _/K./_

 _He stuck close for the rest of the journey to Iacon._

 _He'd been to the province before, but Autobot headquarters was not somewhere he'd dared venture. He transformed when Prowl did, ghosting up the steps in the Enforcer's shadow, staring up at the large building with a sense of impending doom. Prowl seemed to have no such reservations, and swept through the doors with as much confidence as he would have swept into the High Enforcer headquarters back in Praxus. Almost like he already owned the place._

 _Jazz couldn't help but smirk a bit. Knowing Prowl, it would only be a matter of time before he basically did._

 _The shorter mech kept his attention on the rest of the room while Prowl talked to the receptionist, watching who came and went. He automatically accepted the pad that was handed to him and followed Prowl to one side to fill out the form. He pursed his lips as he stared at the prompt on the screen. It was nearly three breems before Prowl lowered his own pad to watch him._

" _You don't have to do this, Jazz." He reminded his friend quietly._

 _Jazz let out a warm vent, his optics still locked onto the prompt. "They're not gonna want me, Prowler." He murmured back. "Th'only reason I pass any background check is because I deleted my files, the only way I pass any psych evaluation is if I lie through my teeth an' neither of those are gonna hold up in the long run." He slumped, lowering the pad and looking up at the Praxian. "What I want t'do's got nothin' t'do with anythin' anymore."_

 _Prowl put a hand on his shoulder. "Perhaps. But there is no harm in trying, Jazz. Whatever you decide to do, I will still be your friend."_

 _A smirk pulled at Jazz's face. "I know. Reminds me, though, ya forgot your energon." He grabbed the cube of energon from subspace and shoved it at Prowl. The Enforcer took it with a return smile._

" _Thank you."_

" _Yeah, yer welcome, glitch." He muttered._

" _You're one to talk." Prowl muttered back as he went back to the pad._

 _Jazz flicked his armor dismissively at the taller mech, flexed his hand, and finally pressed it to the pad. His unique energy signature was read and the data retrieval process began. Jazz fidgeted slightly as he waited for it to finish, and then skimmed through the file. He sighed when he saw that everything in his public records was as he left it—nice and clean. His finger hovered over the confirmation button for almost a breem._

" _Prowl?" the receptionist called. Prowl walked back over to the desk and Jazz watched closely, tuning his audios to listen in, and his optic ridges rose. News regarding important recruits traveled fast around here, apparently, and to high places at that. Prowl nodded, turning toward the door the femme indicated, and glanced over his shoulder to gesture Jazz to follow._

 _The Polyhexian was across the room in a flash, but it was only to protest. "She didn' say anythin' about me comin'."_

" _No, but you're with me, and this is the best chance you have of successfully becoming an Autobot." Prowl countered as they stepped through the door into a hallway beyond. "Trust me, Jazz."_

" _I do, but this is the_ Prime _we're talkin' about, Prowl! There's no fragging way he's gonna want anythin' t'do with me!"_

" _Perhaps not. Or perhaps you underestimate him." Prowl looked down at him as he trotted along beside the mech. "There is no harm in meeting him."_

 _Jazz made a frustrated noise, but didn't object further, sinking into the Praxian's shadow as they came to an elevator and rose through the levels of the base._

" _Y'know, if he's as perceptive as they say, he'll condemn me on the spot." Jazz muttered as they stepped out._

" _If he's as perceptive as they say, then he'll give you a fighting chance." Prowl disagreed. "Same as I did."_

 _Jazz blew out a vent at that, focusing instead on casting his sensors out to be ready to bolt if he needed to. It was an old habit, one he had never truly broken, even if he usually wasn't so serious about it. When Prowl stopped at a particular door and knocked, Jazz was practically hiding behind the Enforcer. Then it opened and a voice came rolling out at them in greeting, riding on the swelling tide of an almost tangible power._

 _Prowl stepped through without hesitation, and then paused. "I'm terribly sorry, Prime, but one moment." He turned back to the door. "Jazz," he called disapprovingly._

 _Jazz had made it about halfway down the hall, and froze mid step, deflating a bit. Reluctantly, he turned around and came back under Prowl's watchful gaze, shuffling into the Prime's office like an errant youngling before a school's headmaster. The presence filling it was overwhelming, but on second thought not particularly_ threatening _._

" _Please, take a seat." The Prime offered, gesturing to the guest chairs across the desk from him. "You must be Prowl, lead tactician for the Praxian High Enforcers."_

" _Until this morning, yes. This is Jazz, my friend. He is informally just as skilled as I am, though in vastly different fields."_

 _Jazz shifted uncomfortably as the Prime smiled. "Welcome, both of you."_

 _And despite everything, Jazz incongruently felt that he was. Instead of soothing him, it only made him more agitated, though._

" _Ya don' want me here." He blurted. Prowl flicked a doorwing at him, but all the Prime did was turn his gaze and full attention on the small mech. The weight of the wisdom and power in the young Prime was almost stifling._

" _And why is that, Jazz?" he asked softly._

 _Jazz shrunk under the gentle compassion in the Prime's gaze. Here he was, sitting before the spiritual leader of Cybertron itself, as close to having a conference with the Maker as he would ever get before he died, and the mech was talking to him like he was anybody else and not…_

" _Jazz has a history of being on the wrong side of the law." Prowl said once the silence had stretched a little too long. "He believes that disqualifies him from being—"_

" _Wrong side of the law." Jazz repeated derisively, giving the Enforcer a withering look. "I am a murderer, Prowl. Plain an' simple." He glanced back at the Prime for an instant before lowering his gaze to the desk between them. "Street gang in Polyhex. I killed people, an' not all of 'em were others like me." He admitted quietly._

 _There was silence in the Prime's office for a very long moment. Jazz focused on the desk, trying to keep himself from exploding under the weight of it. It entirely escaped his notice that the silence was thoughtful and not judgmental as he imagined it to be._

" _When was this?" the Prime asked, and the tone of his deep voice was not what Jazz expected. He dared to look up again, a seed of hope growing in his spark._

"' _Bout 80 vorns ago, now, when Prowl pulled me out of it." He answered quietly._

" _And since then?" The Prime's gaze was intent, but not harsh, or even critical._

 _Jazz winced slightly. "I altered my records… so I could get a job an' everythin', but since that nothin' illegal."_

 _The Prime sat back with a hum, regarding the minibot before him. After a long moment he laced his fingers together on his desk. "Jazz, if it is truly in the past, then I see no reason to drag it into the present. Assuming that is the only reservation you have regarding your eligibility—"_

" _It's not." Jazz interrupted. Prowl's doorwings twitched in surprise, and Jazz was still for a long moment, searching the Prime's blue gaze, but he was_ listening _now to the presence swelling around them and he understood, somewhere in his damaged personality core, that if there was ever going to be another spark in existence that he could trust even close to the way he trusted Prowl, it was Optimus Prime. So Jazz took in and let out a shaky vent, and bared his spark to the Prime, never understanding exactly how much that impressed the mech._

 _By the time he was done talking he was sure he was going to either purge his tanks or straight up keel over dead. Prowl's wings were twitching and his engine was vibrating as if the ex-convict was a youngling in need of comforting, and Jazz supposed he must have been because it was definitely helping. He heaved out another deep vent, and dared to look up at the Prime. Optimus was staring at him intently again, and this time the Prime's gaze was intense in a way it hadn't been before. Jazz dropped his gaze to the desk, fearing that the condemnation he had expected was about to be expressed._

" _Jazz, if this is where you want to be then you are more than welcome to be here." The Prime finally announced with a sense of finality._

 _Jazz's helm shot up. "Seriously?" he demanded._

 _Optimus Prime smiled at him, and nodded._

 _~0~_

"Is there anything else bothering you, Jazz?" Rung prompted after a moment.

Jazz stared intently over the psychiatrist's helm for a few seconds. "Y'know, I didn' know what it was for a long time. Pretty much 'till Prowl pulled me out, I had no clue. I musta been on th'verge of splittin' more'n once in there." He fell silent again and Rung let him think. Then he looked down and focused on the mech. "If I get back t'that point, Rung, I'm pretty sure I will. What happens then?"

Rung tapped at his datapad thoughtfully. "Well, that will depend on the severity of the split. Some splits are barely noticeable and rarely triggered, some are intense to the point of debilitation. I can't help but doubt you will ever reach that point, though, Jazz. Not with the support network you have now."

Jazz tilted his helm. "Hm." He said.

 _~0~_

 _Prowl woke suddenly, casting his sensors wide as unease stirred in his spark. When he couldn't sense anything wrong after several seconds, he cycled a deep vent and shifted a bit, trying to reinitiate recharge. But something was off, even if he couldn't directly observe it, and the unease only grew, eventually urging him to his pedes to make a round through his modest apartment and double check._

 _It was astonishing and alarming on several levels when he almost walked right past the mech curled up in the corner of his living room. The Enforcer whirled when the slightest noise alerted him, rifle in hand and ready to fire. He froze as soon as he made it to that point, though, staring in consternation and mild shock at the Polyhexian staring back at him._

" _Jazz?" he murmured, relaxing only marginally. "How did you get here?"_

 _As far as Prowl knew, the smaller mech hadn't known where he lived, though with the recent ex-convict's skills it shouldn't have been as surprising as it was that he'd figured it out and bypassed the security system so easily. Jazz didn't respond, just kept staring at the Praxian miserably. Prowl slowly put his weapon away, his processor catching up to the situation and spitting out probable causes._

" _Are you alright?" He asked._

 _Jazz's engine groaned quietly and he dropped his helm back against his knees, his newly installed visor flickering out. Prowl straightened, taking a step closer and sending a scan over the mech. He'd just identified what the ex-convict had clutched tightly in one hand when the mech held it out to him, the servo visibly shaking. The Enforcer quickly took the vials, easily recognizing the toxic liquid in them by smell alone._

" _Did you take any, Jazz?" he demanded, though gently._

 _The Polyhexian's vents heaved in distress, but he shook his helm without lifting it. Prowl nodded in relief, carefully placing the illegal drugs in his buffered and shielded subspace pocket specifically set aside for such confiscated items._

" _I didn' know anybody else who would take care of it right." Jazz whispered, his voice muffled and barely audible. He shivered, curling into himself even more, his next words almost lost. "Didn' know anybody else who would help."_

 _Prowl looked down on the quivering pile of mech wedged into the corner of his living room, and he understood. Jazz didn't know anybody else outside of the gangs. He had nowhere else to turn to help him overcome his dangerous impulses, nobody who would be interested in helping him be better._

 _Jazz had nobody else, and as much as his damaged personality core must have been telling him that he couldn't take the risk of asking for help and being turning away, he was here, and he was asking, even if it was silently._

 _The Praxian knelt down, reaching out to put a hand on the smaller mech's shoulder. Jazz's flickering gaze turned up to him for a moment before falling away again. All Enforcers had basic training in psychology and psychological disorders. Mostly they used it to recognize symptoms and to attempt to mitigate or minimize the effects of traumatic events on mecha caught up in them—particularly younglings. Always the number one best thing they could do for mecha already struggling with a psychological disorder or in danger of developing one was to remove them from situations and environments that were unhealthy, unstable, or otherwise toxic._

 _Jazz's environment among the gangs, in prison, and apparently wherever he had been the last three deca-orns had been indisputably and viciously toxic to both spark and mind. The only positive environment the mech had ever experienced in his life was the one Prowl seemed to produce. It was his one shot at getting away from the people and places that had turned him into the mech he had been when he and Prowl had first met. By now, Prowl recognized that the damage was most likely irreversible… but that didn't mean it couldn't be helped, if someone was willing to be patient with him and teach him how to help himself._

 _So the Enforcer smiled at the ex-convict, twitching his wings and vibrating his engine as he would for a distraught youngling, because that's what Jazz was in a lot of ways; a youngling that had been taught to behave in ways that were not good, a child that had never finished maturing because everything around him had constantly told him he couldn't._

 _He felt Jazz relax slightly under his hand, and eventually he looked up to meet his gaze again._

" _Stay here, Jazz. It will be safer for you." He said._

 _Jazz stared at him blankly for a long moment. "Not fer you, though. Ya know there's a pretty hefty price on m'head."_

 _Prowl smirked. "And you know I'm perfectly capable of handling myself."_

 _Jazz stared for another long moment, and then started to smile just a tiny bit, almost shyly. "K." he whispered._

 _Prowl rose to his feet, gesturing to the armchair in the room. "The chair's a bit more comfortable than the floor. It'll have to do until we can set up more permanent accommodations, but we'll talk about that more when the morning comes."_

 _Jazz nodded, accepting the hand Prowl offered to help him to his pedes, his joints creaking as he pulled himself out of his tight curl. He drifted over to the armchair, dropping into it with a weary vent and inspecting the impressive view from the wall of windows it was set before._

 _Prowl was almost out of the room before he heard a very quiet, "Thanks, Prowl."_

 _He paused, turning back with a small smile. "You're welcome, Jazz."_

~0~

"Guess you're pro'ly right." Jazz agreed. "I'm still gettin' worse, though." He frowned to himself. "Any suggestions for that?"

Rung sighed a bit. "Your job is such that it puts you into those situations regularly. Short of avoiding going on high-risk missions, there's not much we can do there. While you're here, though, I would suggest taking time whenever you can to just relax and not think about your work. I know Diffusion has a meditation technique, I believe this would be a good use of it."

"I'm sure Diffusion has a _great_ meditation technique." Jazz drawled. "But I wouldn' know anythin' about it. Didn't train with anybody who'd be interested in that part o'the program, remember?"

"Ah, yes, that's right." Rung murmured. "Then I would suggest asking Prowl to teach you. Circuit Su has an equally effective technique, as I understand it."

Jazz nodded. "Not a bad idea." He murmured. "Dunno why we didn' think of it earlier…"

 _~0~_

" _Hey, Jazz!" A voice called across the prison mess hall. Jazz kept moving as if he hadn't heard, taking a seat at an empty table to drink his morning ration. He gave an almost imperceptible sigh when four other mechs came and sat with him._

" _Y'know, I thought I was bein' pretty obvious." He said._

 _The leader of the small band gave him a hard look. "So were we. Look, Jazz, we got a 380 comin' in, ya need ta be ready ta receive."_

 _Jazz shrugged. "Sounds like your problem, t'me."_

 _The lanky mech narrowed his optics at the other Polyhexian. "You got a responsibility ta fill here, Jazz. I hope ya aren't forgettin' that."_

 _Jazz snarled, armor flaring and engine growling viciously. Before the other mech could so much as lean away he struck, taking his throat in one hand and dragging him halfway across the table. "Now you listen here, Viper, an' you listen close." Jazz hissed into his face. "Ya know what I c'n do, an' ya know I'll do it without much provocation. Take your little minions an' stay away from me. I'm not helpin' ya, now or ever again. Ya understand?"_

 _Viper scowled, pulling at his hand. Guards were approaching, and finally the mech nodded. Jazz released him, taking a gulp of energon._

" _What's going on over here?" one of the guards demanded as he reached them._

 _Jazz grinned easily. "Oh, nothin', sir, just a little missunderstandin'. It's all good now, no worries."_

 _The heavy-set mech didn't look very convinced, but nodded and moved away, keeping an optic on them from a distance._

 _The white and blue minibot smiled brightly at Viper and the other mech scowled. "Good luck an' all, though. You're gonna need it."_

" _You know what this means, Jazz." Viper growled. "There won't be a single place you can go to be safe, once word gets out."_

" _Oh, I don' know about that." Jazz countered. "I c'n think of a few places I can go. Enjoy your energon, V. Somewhere else, though, if ya don't mind."_

 _Jazz kept grinning as the mechs moved off with glares, and whistled cheerfully to himself as he finished his own energon, watching the rest of the hall attentively. When he caught a flash of black and white at one of the guard entrances, he hopped up and disposed of his empty cube, strolling across the hall. He disappeared from most people's perception long before he got to the door, and slipped through easily._

" _Y'catch all that?" he asked nonchalantly._

" _380, that's a communication from the outside, yes?" the Enforcer replied, referencing the datapad in his hand._

" _Sure is. I'd keep an optic on Viper an' Slick. They're th'next best t'receive it. It should come either tonight or tomorrow, in hexi-code. Unless they changed it."_

" _Do they suspect you of giving information yet?"_

 _Jazz grinned sharply, dangerously. "Not yet. This time t'morrow they pro'ly will."_

 _The Praxian peered at him. "You don't seem worried. Do you believe they won't try to start anything over it?"_

" _Oh, they will. They're not terribly smart, after all." The Polyhexian speculated lightly._

" _And you're sure you'll be alright?"_

" _Look, I got this covered." Jazz growled, glaring at the taller mech. "Just be ready t'pull 'em off me like ya said ya would." The Enforcer nodded calmly and the minibot glared a moment longer before grinning. "Alright, see ya tomorrow, Prowl."_

 _The mech nearly skipped back out into the mess hall._

" _I have no idea why we're trusting a word that one says." The guard with Prowl rumbled. "You've seen his file, right? The mech's completely glitched."_

" _Perhaps." Prowl allowed, working at his pad. "But his intel has been useful and accurate so far."_

 _The guard huffed. "If you say so."_

 _The next morning, just outside the mess hall, Viper sidled up next to Jazz as he walked down the hall and leaned down to hiss in his audio._

" _Take the next right, glitch."_

 _Something sharp poked into Jazz's side and he stifled a chuckle, but did as he had been told. He turned the corner and walked straight into a swinging fist. He took the hit, going to the ground, and burst into laughter. Three of the mechs waiting for them grabbed him and drug him further down the hall, away from any guards that would get in their way. There were eleven of them, Jazz noted. A pretty large group. This had to be every one of their mecha in the whole prison complex._

 _He was still giggling when they shoved him up against the wall and Viper stepped in front of him, murder in his optics._

" _You little glitch, you sold us out, didn't you!" he accused. When all Jazz did was laugh some more, the mech snarled, raising his makeshift knife, and stabbed it straight into Jazz's shoulder, where the main gears that controlled the appendage were housed._

 _Jazz's face went blank, and Viper sneered. "Not so funny now, is it, little glitch." He pulled his knife out and energon started trickling down the minibot's armor, even if his expression didn't so much as twitch. "Community law still applies, even here, Jazz. You got anythin' ta say ta defend yourself?"_

 _Jazz shrugged the shoulder that wasn't damaged. "Not really. I found m'self a way out, an' I'm takin' it."_

 _Viper's armor flared aggressively. "It's that Praxian, isn't it?" he demanded. "Ya idiot, you really think he's gonna actually give ya a way out? He's an Enforcer, a_ High _Enforcer at that. You can't trust a word those fraggers say. Thought you knew that, glitch."_

" _Naw, I think this one's different." Jazz disagreed thoughtfully._

" _Oh really?" Viper grinned sharply. "Well then where is he now, Jazz? Because according to community law, your punishment is death. Surely you told him that, since you're so smart."_

" _Y'know, I did. And y'know what your problem is, V?" Jazz smiled brightly. "You're so predictable it's funny."_

" _Freeze." A cool, commanding voice ordered. Exclamations of surprise went up from their sentries at the Praxian's abrupt appearance. Seven guards stepped around the nearest corner, stunner rods raised._

 _Viper snarled, lifting his knife, optics blazing with hate. Jazz twisted, hauling one of the mechs pinning him to the wall into the path of the strike. He jerked his other arm out of the second mech's grip as the guards and gangsters clashed. He slid around to the stabbed mech's other side, snatching the knife from his chest as he collapsed to the floor. Viper only had time to look terrified before Jazz's fist connected with his face, sending him to the floor. The Polyhexian was on him the next instant, knife raised, armor flared and engine growling, a matching snarl on his face._

" _Told ya t'stay away from me, Viper." He hissed._

 _Prowl slipped the stunner in his hand under an armor plate, sending the largest gang member to the floor, and then turned and froze. "Jazz," he called warningly._

 _Jazz looked up sharply, knife pausing its downward arc, and snarled at the Enforcer. Prowl only held his gaze, and gave a slight shake of his head. Jazz hesitated an instant._

 _Three guards went down in quick succession. The nearest one turned to Prowl and stabbed his stunner between the Praxian's doorwings. He dropped with a surprisingly short cry. The remaining three guards fell just as quickly._

" _Change of plan, mechs." The traitorous guard announced._

 _Jazz was on him before anybody else could move. The next thing they knew, the stunner was in Jazz's hand and the guard was on the floor. Viper had taken the opportunity to roll over and snatch the Praxian, though, and Jazz froze to see the stunned Enforcer at the gang officer's mercy._

 _The other mecha grabbed the stunners from the incapacitated guards, reversing the effects of them for their comrades, and soon all eleven of them were back on their feet, as well as the one guard. The stare-down between Jazz and Viper didn't waver._

" _Viper, we don't have time for this," the guard warned._

 _Viper hesitated, glancing away. Prowl closed his hand into a fist. Jazz jammed the stunner on and threw it, launching himself at the gangsters on one side at the same moment Prowl launched himself at the gangsters on the other side._

 _Ten seconds later, they were back to back, surrounded by a pile of stunned mecha. They both straightened, taking one last look around as reinforcements hurried down the halls before removing themselves from ground zero._

" _You're pretty tough, for a Praxian." Jazz quipped, grinning up at the Enforcer._

" _And you're fairly strong, for a minibot." Prowl shot back, smirking._

" _Inmate Jazz, stand down and relinquish your weapons." A guard demanded, approaching cautiously, as if expecting the mech to snap._

 _Jazz did just that, snarling at the guard, lifting the knife and stunner. "Make me, fragger!"_

 _Prowl's hand landed on his shoulder. "Jazz," he admonished._

 _Jazz switched his grip on the knife, drawing it back, ready to strike, and then paused. After a long moment where nobody moved so much as an inch, the Polyhexian's armor flattened and he straightened out of his fighting stance. "Yeah, okay." He agreed, tossing both weapons to the flabbergasted guard._

 _Prowl smirked at the guard a bit as he gestured Jazz away from the cleanup. "Come, let's get you to the med-bay for that shoulder wound. I can hear the gears grinding in there."_

" _Yeah, lucky Viper's so dumb he didn't put that knife deep enough t'actually do any real damage."_

" _Indeed."_

~0~

The saboteur checked his chronometer. "I never understand where the time goes in this room." He commented.

Rung smiled ruefully. "I've never figured it out, either. You're welcome to stay and talk longer, if you want, of course."

Jazz shook his helm. "Naw, it's getting late, an' I'm sure dealin' with all us crazy folk wears ya out. Besides, Prowl's still up an' we're both off duty. I c'n get 'im t'start teachin' me how t'meditate properly right away if I catch 'im now."

"Until next time, then, Jazz." Rung agreed, noting some things down on his datapad while the saboteur got to his feet. But then the psychiatrist paused, a curious expression coming to his face. "Jazz," he said hesitantly, turning to the minibot.

"Yeah?" Jazz asked, pausing at the door.

"If you don't mind me asking, why _is_ Prowl the only person you respond to like that?"

The Polyhexian seemed to freeze for a moment.

 _~0~_

 _The op had been going perfectly. Jazz had recognized that it was going a bit_ too _perfectly, but he hadn't said anything, letting events run their course while he waited patiently. Once the Enforcers descended on his fellows, it was the matter of only a breem to hack their primary command channel. It took only a few seconds longer to pinpoint the source of the calm, commanderly voice speaking over it._

 _/Alpha team mission accomplished./_

 _/Beta team mission accomplished./_

 _/Beta team, hand off your prisoners to Alpha team and assist Delta team in the east wing./ the tactician ordered. /Approach from the north and south ends, be prepared for at least twelve contacts./_

 _Jazz slipped into the mobile tactical command center without a sound, and struck early when the nearest mech turned to him. Praxians, he cursed to himself. Annoyingly hard to sneak up on. Still, he had the first mech in a set of stasis cuffs and a knife at his throat before the second mech could do more than pull out his rifle and aim it. Acid pellet, Jazz recognized. Interesting choice._

 _The calm voice on the comm didn't waver as it called a team back to tactical command. Jazz grinned sharply, pulled out his own gun, blew the door open, and slipped out with his hostage. So predictable, he mused as fire was held. He was surrounded before he'd gotten far, but of course the Enforcers didn't know he had a grapple. They were on the roof of the nearest building before anybody could do anything about it._

 _Jazz set his hostage down, chuckling to himself darkly. The Praxian promptly tried to kick him and he snarled, stomping down on the offending pede. "No, bad tactician." He barked. "Be good. Won't be here long, anyway." He assured the mech with a cheerful smile. "Judging by the way your commander was handling things down there…" he paused, tilting his helm. "Wow, not long at all." Jazz grinned sharply down on his bewildered prisoner, stepping up beside him and leveling his rifle at his helm. "Lucky you."_

 _The red and blue mech's optics widened as the weapon powered up, but then the Polyhexian seemed to change his mind and stepped over the prone form, plopping down to sit on the number 38 on his chest. The rifle stayed powered up, but it rested on the tactician's shoulder, pointed at the ground next to his head._

" _What is_ wrong _with you?" the mech wondered._

" _Shut up." Jazz growled, clubbing him with the weapon. The Praxian obliged, wincing as he shifted to relieve some of the pressure on his doorwings. A breem went by._

" _Does your commander usually stand behind closed doors waiting for someone t'call 'im out, or what?" the gangster wondered._

 _The access door inched open, admitting the other tactician onto the roof. Surprisingly enough, the other Enforcers stayed back, letting the door close behind him as the Praxian slowly approached, rifle held ready even if it wasn't aimed. He halted several steps away and regarded the minibot, his gaze passing over his fellow before returning to Jazz._

" _What do you want?" the mech asked._

" _Isn't that a good question!" Jazz crowed. "Y'know, I'm not even sure anymore. Used t'be energon. Then it was safety. Now I'm not even sure what the frag we're all doin' up here. Could've gone about this a million different ways, an' I do mean a million, I calculated 'em all out." He rambled. Then he growled, armor flaring aggressively. He shoved his rifle in his hostage's face, glaring at the other Praxian. "Nobody cares. Ya want th'rookie back, ya go through me, simple as that."_

 _The commander's doorwings twitched back, maybe in surprise. Slowly, he straightened, and lowered his rifle, studying the mech. There was an insane gleam in those red optics, but nothing he hadn't seen before. In fact, the desperation there was all too familiar._

" _No." he said simply._

" _No?" Jazz repeated. The Praxian he was sitting on squeaked, optics wide when he turned to grin down at the younger mech. "Guess they don' want'cha back, kid. Don' I know how_ that _feels. But in that case," he moved fluidly to his feet, grabbing the Praxian and hauling him to the edge of the roof._

" _Stop." The other tactician ordered._

 _Jazz glanced back, lifting an optic ridge, face almost blank. Without breaking optic contact, he shoved his hostage against the railing._

" _Prowl!" the mech yelped, trying to lean away from the deadly drop. Prowl glanced at the younger mech, and the rookie's doorwings twitched before his chassis went still, responding to silent words of assurance._

 _Jazz grinned. "I'm impressed, I'll admit it. You're pretty good at this, way better than any o'the Enforcers around here. Where ya from? Couple'a Praxian tacticians, gotta be High Enforcers." His grin turned down to a snarl. "Gotta be important." He pushed at the Praxian again, and he didn't cry out this time, though his doorwings flinched violently at his precarious position, chassis tensed._

 _Prowl only cocked his helm, continuing to study the mech. He slowly shook his head, putting his rifle into subspace. "I'm not going to kill you."_

" _I'm not gonna give ya a choice." Jazz growled, and sent the younger tactician over the edge._

 _The next thing he knew, he was on the ground and Prowl was hauling his rookie back over the railing._

" _Wow. That was unexpected." The minibot quipped, and launched himself at the larger mech, ditching gun for knife. The vibrating growl in his engine was discordant as he attacked, distinctly abnormal. Prowl grunted as the knife sliced into a joint, sending fluids spurting across the metal of the building. But it didn't seem to make a difference. He didn't get angry, or even slow down, and Jazz let out a vicious snarl of frustration as the mech countered every attack he threw at him without returning the assault._

 _The gangster whirled, sliding in for the kill, and was met with a solid punch to the face that sent him reeling back. He collapsed to his hands and knees, venting harshly as he recognized the feel of energon running down his face. "Why don't you fight back, glitch!" he demanded, throwing his knife as hard as he could at the Praxian._

 _Prowl simply caught it, and Jazz's face went blank. "That's not even fair." He complained mildly._

 _The tactician stepped closer, regarding the Polyhexian. "I'm not going to kill you." He repeated, almost gently._

" _Why not!?" Jazz cried, staring up at the mech almost pleadingly._

 _Prowl slowly knelt down, keeping the mech's gaze, and then held his knife out to him. "Because you are worth saving."_

 _Jazz's optics went wide as he stared. For several breems, nobody even vented on that rooftop as Jazz stared at Prowl, reading the impossible conviction in him that it was absolutely true. That he was worth saving. He was not. He knew that. This stranger did not know him, did not know what he had done. And yet, as he hesitantly reached out to take the weapon and the Praxian didn't so much as flinch, didn't waver in his quiet confidence, Jazz believed it. He believed that he was worth saving._

 _He carefully took his knife, rolling back onto his aft and cocking his helm at the Praxian. "You're weird."_

" _I've been told." The mech replied seriously._

 _Then Jazz smiled, an honest smile. It felt like he hadn't smiled like that in vorns. "I like you."_

 _Prowl smiled back, his mouth just barely turning up. "Thank you."_

~0~

Jazz blinked out of his blank expression and smiled a bit, shrugging. "I trust 'im." He answered simply.

Then he turned and disappeared through the door.

"Hey, Prowl!" Rung heard him greet cheerfully. "Rung says ya need ta teach me how t'meditate."

"Does he?" Prowl hummed back, sounding bemused. The door slid closed on the rest of the conversation and Rung smiled to himself as he finished jotting down his notes for the session. Then he put his pad away, set his office in order, and headed for his room. As Jazz had surmised, after all, as much as he loved his job and his patients, dealing with the toxic amounts of mental instability among the Autobots was, indeed, exhausting.

* * *

A/N: In case it wasn't as obvious as it was in my head, italicized sections are flashbacks, and the flashbacks are regressing in time as the story goes along.

And go look up borderline personality disorder if you're still lost. ; )

As always, reviews are welcomed and appreciated!


	2. Making Friends

AN: So... I thought I was done, but Jazz decided otherwise. ; )

There will be more of this coming, though not with any sort of time guarantees. Sorry 'bout that.

* * *

Jazz transformed when Prowl did, ghosting up the steps in the Enforcer's shadow. He seemed almost comfortable as he glanced up at the simple, if imposing building, but his position in Prowl's shadow disputed that image. Prowl swept through the doors like he owned the place. The people in the lobby reacted accordingly, nodding or calling out 'good orn, sir'. A few let the tactician know that they had various reports or files ready for him. Prowl accepted or returned all these things with a grace born of familiarity, deftly ignoring the double takes nearly all of them did when they noticed Jazz on the enforcer's heels. Jazz attempted a few smiles at the unfamiliar mecha, but he knew they were weak, sort of lopsided, and he gave up quickly.

These people did not like him, did not want him here, and were not interested in being friendly. The more he kept his helm down, the better his chances of walking out of here a free mech.

 _The better your chances of surviving,_ a sinister voice whispered in the back of his helm. He frowned at it. _No,_ he thought back. _That wouldn't happen. Prowl wouldn't let it._

Pieces of him weren't convinced, but most of him was. Prowl hadn't let him down yet, why would he now? Those reassuring thoughts didn't stop him from identifying every exit he could see and constructing escape scenarios in his head. Better safe than sorry, you know.

He was still in Prowl's shadow as the mech stopped at the front desk to get a few datapads and drop off a couple more, chatting casually with the receptionist. Jazz kept one audio on the conversation, the other on the rest of the room and his optics on the mecha moving about their business. He had no intention of leaving Prowl's shadow… until he spotted white and blue doorwings, and a number 38 flashing through the crowd.

He glanced up at Prowl, uncertain, but the Praxian didn't look like he was going to be moving anytime soon, and Jazz felt that this was something he really should take care of—or at least try to take care of—on his own. So he slipped away.

"Hey, rookie!"

The young Praxian jumped nearly a mile, whirling around so fast he almost fell over. Jazz held up his hands calmingly at the almost panicked look the mech gave him. He didn't miss the twitch of the tactician reaching for his gun, and tried to keep his smile in place as his mood dropped because of it. The voice in the back of his mind was whispering terrible things to him again, mostly that confronting the rookie alone was going to be the mistake that cost him.

"I's Smokescreen, right?" he asked, hiding his nervousness.

Smokescreen just gave him a very strange look, doorwings high and frame tense. "Um… what are you doing here?" he asked.

"M'with Prowl, he jus' had ta drop a few things off an' pick some up," Jazz explained, rocking back on his heels.

Smokescreen's optics narrowed suspiciously. "Why are you with Prowl?"

"Long story," the Polyhexian admitted, scratching at the back of his helm. "Look, Smoky, I jus' wanted t'say… m'sorry. That I… threw ya offa buildin'… an' everythin'…"

Smokescreen's optics only narrowed further, as if he didn't know what to make of this and wasn't sure he believed it.

"So…" Jazz fumbled for something else to say, wishing he hadn't initiated this conversation in the first place. "Yeah. Sorry 'bout that. Won't happen again, promise."

He kept his gaze on the floor. His armor flicked as anger shot through him at the Praxian's continued silence, and he struggled to quell the emotion.

"Ok," Smokescreen finally said, sounding like he wasn't sure if it was okay at all.

"Cool, see ya 'round, then!" Jazz said quickly, and disappeared back into the crowd, reappearing in Prowl's shadow.

The older tactician glanced down without missing a beat in the conversation he was having with a coworker. The other mech did, his doorwings flicking back in uncertainty. Prowl's twitched to encourage him to continue, and the mech complied, eying the minibot. Jazz didn't seem to be paying any attention to the conversation, but he wrapped up quickly anyway and headed back to work.

Prowl turned to the exit, already perusing the datapads, and Jazz was on his heels.

"Prowl," a new voice called.

Prowl stopped immediately, turning and saluting the taller Praxian approaching them. "Chief," he greeted respectfully.

The Chief's attention was locked onto Jazz already, and the Polyhexian shrank a bit, making sure his venting wasn't too obvious.

"This the Crystal you've taken under your wing?" he asked.

Jazz's armor flared in anger. "M'not a Crystal anymore," he snapped.

Prowl put a hand on his shoulder. A noticeable hush fell on the lobby at the outburst. All it did was fuel Jazz's anger, and a low growl started building in his engine.

"Jazz," Prowl said calmly. Jazz glanced up sharply, ready to snarl at the mech, but the stolidity in his gaze stopped him short. It gave him something to center on. His armor relaxed and he looked down, wishing the floor would swallow him whole.

"Sorry," he murmured.

"Jazz, this is Chief Intrepid. Intrepid, Jazz," Prowl introduced them, moving on easily. "Jazz was just released a couple decacycles ago. I'm helping him get back on his feet."

"I see," Intrepid hummed, his gaze heavy on the minibot. "You almost cost me one of my best tacticians," he said to Jazz, his tone almost neutral.

Jazz cocked his helm at the slight probing he could sense in the statement. "Yeah," he agreed. "Sorry 'bout that. Won't happen again."

Intrepid's doorwings flared slightly. "No. It won't. Next time everyone will have orders to shoot."

Jazz looked up to meet the Chief's gaze, and he could tell that the mech wasn't bluffing. The thought occurred to him, not for the first time, he knew not for the last time, that Prowl was the _only_ person on his side on the entire planet. After a moment, he nodded. "Understood, sir."

Intrepid relaxed, a smirk flashing across his face. "Good luck," he said—to him or Prowl, Jazz wasn't sure. The Chief nodded to Prowl and walked away. Prowl promptly turned for the exit again, somehow sensing that Jazz needed to be out of there _right now_. They fell to their altmodes once they were on the street again, and went on their way.

It was a long time before Jazz backed off from the Praxian's bumper.

~0~

Jazz let out a long, long vent, sinking until he was almost underneath the table and couldn't see the datapad anymore. He didn't want to look at it anymore. He didn't like it.

"You sound discouraged," Prowl commented blandly.

Jazz edged up to peer across the table at his only friend, glaring mildly. "Really? Feelin' GREAT. Dunno what gave ya tha' impression."

Prowl seemed amused, the hint of a smirk on his face as he continued to peruse the newsfeed on his own datapad, but he didn't comment further.

Jazz slowly worked his way back into a somewhat upright position, staring at the list on his datapad. Black despair welled up in his spark and he dropped his helm onto the table, slumping. "Who'm I kiddin'?" he muttered. "There ain't no way I c'n get a job, Prowler."

Prowl glanced up, lifting an optic ridge at the nickname. "Of course you can. You simply need to get a job that can cater to your skills and mental landscape." The tactician reached over and picked up the other mech's datapad, setting his own aside. He scrolled through the job listings for a moment, frowning slightly. There were over 500 of them. "Why do you still have so many?"

"Did I mention I suck at makin' decisions when I c'n think about 'em?" Jazz muttered.

Prowl shook his head, sitting back and deleting a few that he knew were no good. "Alright. Start with the basics—what you know for certain. What are you good at?"

Jazz sat up slowly, a darkness about him. "Killing people. I'm really good at killing people."

Prowl just looked at him, unfazed. "Military," he said, making a note on the pad.

Jazz sank back down to the table. "M'not stable enough fo' that," he muttered.

"One variable at a time." Prowl told him. "What else?"

Jazz was silent for a long minute. "Stealin'. M'really good at that, too."

Prowl sighed, flicking his wings back. "You're thinking about this all wrong, Jazz. These are applications of your skills, not the skills themselves."

Jazz sat up quickly, looking almost startled. He stared at the Praxian for a long moment, and then grinned. "Guess so. A'right. M'good at lookin' at someone an' knowin' they're hidin' somethin'. I c'n hack an' code pretty well. I know how t'fight. I c'n get inta places. I know weapons. I c'n get around without bein' seen." He paused, cocking his helm as he thought. Prowl was busy deleting jobs, and then frowned as something occurred to him. He switched to the search page.

Jazz sat forward, sensing that his friend was onto something. Finally, Prowl smirked victoriously, setting the pad down and turning it to him.

"Security," he said with finality.

Jazz recoiled slightly, obviously confused. "Wouldn' I be better at breakin' 'em?"

Prowl nodded. "Exactly. If you can break it, it can be improved."

"True, that," Jazz murmured, taking the pad and scrolling through the search results.

Prowl smiled a bit at the intense concentration that fell over the ex-convict, and then picked up his own pad to continue reading the news.

~0~

Turns out, not unexpectedly, that Jazz was terrible at interviewing. The few interviews he did get were at rather run-down or questionable establishments for jobs he probably didn't want anyway. The vast majority of his applications were rejected almost instantly—due, he was entirely certain, to his criminal record.

Prowl tried to coach him. He tried really hard to teach him how to talk to strangers, but Prowl wasn't a stranger to him. He could talk to Prowl because he _trusted_ Prowl. He couldn't afford to trust strangers, even without his predisposition not to.

The problem started keeping him up at night. The anxiety brought all of his temptations back into his spark, into his head, into his chassis itself. Far too often he found himself flipping a knife around without thinking about it, sometimes even while Prowl was in the room, and the mindlessness of it terrified him. Prowl never gave him a second glance, because Jazz hadn't told him yet that one of his strongest impulses was to stab the nearest person.

Jazz couldn't imagine anything more _horrifying_ than stabbing his only friend in the world. Couldn't imagine anything worse than losing the only person who cared even the slightest bit about what happened to him due to his own fragged up mind. So he tried to stop.

But that only brought the other temptations closer to the front. It made his mood swings sharper and more aggressive, and that scared him almost as much as the knife flipping. He could push Prowl away just as effectively that way as he could by stabbing him. Again, he couldn't imagine anything worse, so again he tried to stop. And it only made things worse.

His habit of pacing while he should have been sleeping wasn't helping, either.

But then, one night while he was wearing circles in the kitchen floor, Prowl walked in and glared. His doorwings were twitching in agitation. Jazz realized he must have woken the other mech up and flattened his armor, grinning ruefully.

"Sorry," he tried to apologize.

Prowl pointed sharply at one of the chairs at the table. "Sit," he ordered.

Jazz slunk into the chair, helm lowered guiltily. Prowl took the other seat and folded his hands on the table, his gaze displeased. Neither of them spoke for a long moment.

Prowl's doorwings relaxed slightly. "Tell me what the problem is, Jazz," he prompted.

Jazz shifted in his seat, muttering something. Prowl sighed deeply. "Is it the job search?" he guessed.

Jazz slumped onto the table with a whine and tried really hard not to cry. Prowl reached over to put a hand on his back, his engine thrumming as it would to comfort a child. It worked, as always, and less than a breem later Jazz was confident enough to speak, even if he didn't sit back up.

"I's never gonna work, Prowler. There's no way I c'n get an actual job," he whispered.

"I don't believe that's true, Jazz," Prowl countered gently. "If your current method isn't working, then perhaps you simply need a change in your strategy."

Jazz took a deep vent and let it out. "Yeah. Maybe," he allowed.

Prowl gave him a pat and stood up with another sigh. "Please get some rest. We can talk about this more later, but you can't think properly if you don't have adequate rest."

"K."

Prowl went back to his room. Jazz didn't move for a long time, thinking.

A change in strategy. Yes, that sounded good. The bigger problem, though, was getting people to look at him twice. His criminal record—his old life—was going to follow him around for the rest of his new one, and there wasn't anything he could do about that. He was doomed.

 _So change your strategy._

Jazz sat up slowly, his face almost blank. He glanced at Prowl's door, and then shook his head. But he sat there for the rest of the night, thinking some more. He was still there when Prowl got up to go to work, and barely acknowledged the Praxian. As soon as Prowl was gone, though, he got up and left the apartment.

He had some business to attend to, and he couldn't do it from there.

~0~

He was back long before Prowl was, and he started over with the job search. Completely over.

When Prowl got home he came over almost immediately to ask if he wanted to talk about things.

"Yeah," he quickly agreed, accepting the cube of energon Prowl offered. "So, been thinkin' a lot 'bout changin' m'strategy, an' I was thinkin' 'bout how ya said I'd be good at security 'cause I c'n get inta places, but I'm th'worst at interviews. So how do I get in?" He grinned, and Prowl lifted an optic ridge. "Ev'rybody loves a challenge, right?" He held up his pad, showing the mech his new resume. "I'm sendin' this t'corporate heads," he explained gleefully.

"And how are you getting it to them?" Prowl asked, and then held up a hand. "Never mind, I don't want to know." He smiled. "Good luck."

The Enforcer settled himself in the second armchair in the room, the ex-convict repositioned in his so his friend couldn't see the screen, and they fell into comfortable silence.

By the end of the day, Jazz had three hits. Dozens of replies, most asking how in the pit he'd managed to get the addresses he'd sent the message to, but three mecha willing to take his challenge. He grinned to himself as he set up 'interviews'. For once, for the first time in his life, things were working out for him. He could feel, somewhere in his spark, that it wasn't going to be short lived.

This was his second chance at life. He wasn't going to waste it.


	3. Over the Edge

AN: Enjoy, you psychos : D

Oh, a guest reviewer asked if Jazz/Prowl is my brotp

Let me tell ya

Jazz/Prowl is my BROTP TO END ALL BROTPs. (So if anyone was wondering and hadnt read our disclaimer on our profile... no, no slash. You will have to go elsewhere for that : P ) (Italicized portions are flashbacks again, at varying points in the past)

* * *

It was eating at him again, the anxiety and the fear and the anger, the _hate_. He tried his hardest to channel the energy, to meditate it away and find the stability to keep his head, but it wasn't happening. There were too many things going wrong at the moment, and too many of those things were entirely his fault. He had learned to live with uncertainty, he had learned to thrive on it, in fact, but this time was different. This time it was going to come crashing down on him, he could just _feel_ it looming, and he wasn't going to be able to handle the fallout when it did.

~0~

" _Jazz," Prowl murmured._

 _The saboteur paused halfway through the door, hanging off the doorframe as he looked back at his friend. "Yeah?"_

 _The Praxian looked up from the datapad on his desk, steepling his fingers. "Take care of him."_

 _Jazz gave a crisp salute, smirking just a bit. "I'll get 'im back to ya, Prowler, I promise."_

 _Prowl nodded, and Jazz was gone in the same instant._

 _~0~_

The energy bars on his cell deactivated and rough hands grabbed him, hauling him up and dragging him out. He snarled curses and threats at his captors, struggling to break free, but there was only so much he could do with stasis cuffs on both his wrists and his ankles and three levels of neural buffers attached to the back of his helm. He could barely make out the hallway they were in as it was.

He was shoved onto an interrogation berth, the same one he'd been shoved onto twice before already, and restrained to it before he could do much damage. A few seconds later one of the neural buffers came off and his vision finally cleared. He recognized that the interrogation setup was different this time and dread filled his spark to see a second berth waiting for an occupant. His guards left the room and Jazz instantly got to work, searching for weaknesses in the restraints and buffers that he could exploit.

He only had less than a breem before the door opened again. A guard entered, shoving a cuffed Praxian ahead of him. Bluestreak stumbled to his knees and was drug to his feet by a doorwing. He stifled a yelp. Jazz growled viciously, but held his tongue. Blue glanced over, relief and concern flashing across his face in quick succession before he was pushed onto the other interrogation berth and restrained. The Decepticon guard left quickly, sneering at both of them.

"Jazz," Bluestreak said, voice trembling as he stared at the damage the saboteur had taken. "Are you okay?"

"M'fine, Blue. You?"

"I'm—I'm okay." The young mech said quietly. He wiggled, wincing at the way his doorwings scraped against the berth. Jazz wished it was as uncomfortable as the Praxian would get, but he knew there was little hope for that.

"Well then, Autobots, why don't we get started?" Fissure suggested as he swept into the room. He went straight to the table of torture instruments and tapped his chin as he looked over them.

"Th' kid don't know anythin'." Jazz growled, glaring at the Decepticon from behind his visor.

"Of course not." Fissure scoffed, waving a hand dismissively and finally picking up a nasty looking device. He turned to the Autobot head of special operations with a smile. "That's not what I need him for."

The orange and grey mech strolled over to Bluestreak and the sniper seemed to shrink, optics wide, fixated on the instrument in the 'Con's hand.

"Don't touch him!" Jazz snapped.

Fissure grinned widely. "You have the power to stop me, Jazz. You know what I want to hear."

The saboteur clenched his jaw, firmly closing his mouth, and the Decepticon shrugged, turning back to Bluestreak. "Praxians. My favorite subjects." He murmured, studying the young mech's elegant doorwings with an eager light in his optics. He stepped up to the berth, checking to be sure Jazz could see what he was doing, and brought the tool in his hand to bear.

There wasn't a single source of stability in the whole Primus-damned universe that could keep him calm after that.

~0~

 _The pressure in his head made it feel like his helm was splitting open and being compressed down to a single point at the same time. It was loud and oppressively silent, it made him hyperaware of everything around him and perfectly numb to his own chassis. If there was a Pit, he knew he was in it. He kind of figured he'd been created into it._

 _Someone approached him in his dark corner, speaking to him. The words were there and made sense without being recognizable. He snapped, lashing out at the unwelcome presence in his personal Pit. A blade flashed in his grip, and the pressure eased off a bit more with every downward stroke. The screaming became clearer as the pain faded, until—_

 _~0~_

The pressure in his head and spark was pain as he had never experienced it, and the panic welling up in his chassis was not helping. He had promised. He had _promised_ to bring Bluestreak back. _He had promised_ and this was one promise he was not going to break, dammit.

He attacked the neural buffers with a rage he hadn't felt in a long time, and didn't try to quell it.

~0~

— _it stopped._

 _He stared at the energon puddling on the floor underneath him, watched it drip off his knife and hands blankly. The pressure wasn't so bad now, and he could think somewhat straight again. Just enough to pick up his planning from where he'd left off last time he'd been able to think clearly. He needed something to keep the pressure at bay, and after a long joor of watching the energon congeal and thinking, he finally started rifling through his subspace looking for something that would do that for him._

 _The chemical quieted the pain in his spark, clearing his mind even more, and he got up, washed himself off, and left the apartment. Someone was waiting for him when he did._

" _Jazz."_

" _Yeeeup."_

" _We're headin' up ta Protihex in a joor fer th'arms deal, you in?"_

 _Jazz smirked. He needed to get out of town for a while, anyway. "Sure thing, V."_

 _Viper grinned. "I'll let th'Boss know."_

 _The pressure was growing before they even arrived in Protihex. Planning helped take his mind off it, and he spent the joors mapping out every creative solution to his problems, some portion of his processor always watching for opportunities to implement one. They rarely ever came, though, and when they did there was always some complicating factor that held him back. It was as if the universe was against him on this, as if it wanted him to keep suffering forever._

 _Frag that, he thought. He just needed to go for it, forget about the complications. He was flexible enough to make it work, he knew he was._

 _Next opportunity, then, he decided. Next chance he got, he was taking it._

 _No matter what._

 _~0~_

The buffers were down and the restraints were starting to give, he could feel it, but they weren't giving out _fast enough._

And then the screaming stopped.

Jazz jerked back to the physical world so fast he nearly fragmented himself. Bluestreak was silent and still where Fissure was leaning over him, holding a larger torture instrument than he had started with. For an instant, Jazz couldn't tell if the Praxian was alive or not.

The pressure in his mind seemed to explode, tearing through every barrier he had created to contain it, and rage was the only thing he knew.

"Pity." Fissure murmured, reaching out to start a reboot. "I was hoping he'd be a little more—"

A scream tore out of him as his arm was ripped off. With a second, almost effortless motion, Jazz relieved the Decepticon of his other arm, and stood over the mech, watching the energon drain out of the appendage while Fissure writhed on the floor. He turned red optics down on the Decepticon, and started to grin. There was something… _wrong_ with the expression, something in the light of the Autobot's optics that wasn't normal, something in his mannerisms that was different. There was nothing Fissure could do about it, though, as the mech pulled a knife out of subspace and reached for him.

The door slid open and guards poured in. Nobody noticed in the ensuing chaos when Bluestreak came back online.

The light took a hit and half the cells went out, half of the rest flickering rapidly and casting the room into distorted shadows. Everything stilled suddenly, two bodies hitting the ground almost at the same moment, and one small form was left standing among the massacre, energon running off his knife and arms, down the front of his chassis, speckling his visor-less face.

"J-jazz?" Bluestreak whispered.

The mech whirled into a fighter's crouch, a low growl vibrating through him and a snarl on his face. Bluestreak's vents wheezed in distress, a quiet keen growing in his engine at the expression, so foreign to the mech he knew. "Jazz, it's me." The young sniper almost sobbed.

The snarl faded off the saboteur's face. After a long moment of just staring, he straightened and turned away. Shock and pain kept Bluestreak silent, but Jazz never made it to the door. He only took two steps before his legs seemed to give out and he collapsed to the floor.

"Jazz? Jazz!" the Praxian called, concern replacing the hurt and fear in an instant.

Jazz groaned, starting to sit up. He put a hand to his helm and looked around at the bodies on the floor, looked down at the energon caking his hands and knife, and his own ran cold.

"Jazz?" Bluestreak called again, tentatively. "Are you alright?"

The saboteur scrambled up, tossing his knife into subspace and engaging his visor. "Primus, Blue, are you? Never mind, we gotta get outa here."

Bluestreak kept quiet as Jazz quickly freed him and slung one of the taller mech's arms over his shoulders, pulling him toward the door.

~0~

Both of their comms were fried, but Jazz managed to rig something up that got a signal out to Iacon. Within a joor, a stealth transport arrived to pick them up, and in another joor they were in the Iacon med-bay. Jazz stayed just long enough to hear Ratchet say that the kid was going to be fine, and then he slipped away.

Less than a breem later, Prowl strode in, keen gaze instantly fixing on the group of medics flitting around his charge, and he silently pinged Ratchet for information.

"Busy, don't get in the way!" the medic snapped.

"Will he be alright?" Prowl pressed.

"Yes, he'll be—" Ratchet paused, blowing out a deep vent and looking up at the older Praxian. The tell-tale signs of concern were there to see, if one knew how to look, and the CMO softened just a bit. "He was awake and coherent when he arrived. Physically, he will recover fully. That's all I can tell you at this point, Prowl. We'll let you know when we wake him up."

Prowl nodded, but his frame didn't relax much as he stepped back and took a look around the med-bay. "Where's Jazz?"

Ratchet's helm shot up and his gaze darted around his domain. "Fragging GLITCH!" he barked. "He was here a second ago!"

"I'll find him," Prowl assured the medic.

"Bring the fragger back when you do!" The CMO ordered, and Prowl could hear his irritated grumbling all the way to the med-bay doors.

~0~

Jazz turned on the water as hot as it would go and stood in it for a long moment, staring blankly at the far wall. Then he looked at the energon clinging stubbornly to his hands and sat down hard.

He remembered Fissure. He remembered Bluestreak, laying still and silent and dark. He remembered being angry, and the pressure. And then… nothing. Until he woke up surrounded by a pile of bodies and covered in their energon. He could not remember, but he knew what must have happened, and if he had done it and couldn't remember doing it…

"Jazz?"

He couldn't take his gaze off the dissolving energon, and didn't move when a gentle hand landed on his shoulder.

"Jazz, what happened?" Prowl asked softly.

"I…I think…" the saboteur whispered, still not looking up.

"Jazz?" Prowl said, taking both shoulders and giving him a gentle shake.

"I think I split, Prowl." The mech looked up finally, starting to tremble. "I don'… I don' remember…"

The tactician knelt forward, concern on his face, and Jazz leaned into him with a strangled keen. The next half joor was spent with Prowl murmuring comfort to his friend while Jazz sobbed and shook uncontrollably. It was no surprise that it was only a couple breems after the Polyhexian finally calmed down that he slipped into recharge.

Prowl didn't even bother trying to finish cleaning the energon off or drying the mech before he hefted him up and took him to the med-bay.

~0~

Bluestreak groaned quietly, squinting against the med-bay lights. He blinked away the reports swarming his vision, and by the time his optics focused he could recognize Prowl leaning over him.

"How do you feel?" his guardian asked quietly.

"I'm—" he paused, wincing a bit. "I'm okay, I guess." The sniper gasped, optics going wide as he remembered why he felt so worried. "Jazz!" he exclaimed, trying to sit up. First Aid and Prowl both gently restrained him. "Is he okay? Something was wrong, he wasn't acting right, he—"

"We know, Bluestreak." Prowl interrupted, giving the mech's shoulder a comforting squeeze. "We're working on it. He'll be alright."

Bluestreak relaxed, smiling in relief. "Oh, that's good. Wow, I thought something really bad had happened, it was super scary, Prowl, I'm so glad he's going to be okay."

Prowl forced himself to smile, and First Aid was quick to jump in. "Speaking of which, Blue, we need to hear what happened from you… just to get a complete picture on what happened. If you wouldn't mind?"

"Oh, of course! Um…" the young mech glanced at Prowl, doorwings twitching in their cradles. "Where do you want me to start?" he asked.

/Prowl, office, now./

Prowl pinged acknowledgement and put a hand on Bluestreak's shoulder again. "Be honest, Bluestreak. I'll be back soon." He murmured. Bluestreak nodded quickly, looking almost relieved.

Ratchet was pouring over three different medical readouts when Prowl stepped in. The CMO gave the Praxian an almost accusatory glance. "Nobody fragging told me he was this bad." The mech growled.

"I didn't know he was." Prowl admitted quietly, doorwings drooping a tiny bit. "Is he stable?"

"Physically, he's fine. Mentally?" Ratchet gestured violently. Prowl pursed his lips as he took a seat, doorwings sweeping back in concern. The door chimed and Ratchet glanced at it, letting it open. Rung hurried in and took a seat as well. From the sound of his engine, he'd run all the way here.

"How is he?" the psychologist asked.

Ratchet glared. "How is he? Thoroughly split, that's how he is! There's a gash through his core personality coding so complete I don't even know how to patch it! You can't fragging tell me neither of you noticed he was this close to splitting!"

"He's been under a lot of stress lately, but he appeared to have it under control." Rung said quietly, looking pained.

"He usually does." Prowl murmured. "Is there anything we can do for him, Ratchet?"

The CMO growled, glancing over his readouts again. "I've already contacted Neurosis, he's getting on a medical priority transport ASAP, he should be here within an orn. Meanwhile, this," he gestured to one of the data projections, one that was scrolling coding past on one side and diagnostics on the other. "This is an almost perfect split, from what I can see, and that puts it far beyond the scope of my training and experience. We _might_ be able to do something because we're able to address it so soon after it happened, but it will take a lot of work, and a lot of time." Ratchet sat down with a deep vent, staring at both mechs hard. "I won't know more until I hear back from Neurosis. When he arrives, we'll take a second look, do what we can, and go from there. I'm keeping him in medical stasis for now."

There was a knock at the door and Ratchet triggered it without asking. First Aid stepped in, holding a datapad tightly. "Bluestreak's description of what happened." He said. He seemed subdued and concerned, even for First Aid, and all three older mechs knew that was a bad thing. Ratchet accepted the pad with a grim nod and First Aid left. The CMO went over the file with a frown that only deepened as he read. When he finally set it down, it was to rub at his face with a deep sigh.

"Fragging wonderful." He muttered.

"What does it say?" Prowl asked quietly, already knowing it wasn't going to be pretty.

"The 'Con was torturing Bluestreak trying to get Jazz to talk. Bluestreak went into emergency stasis, and when he came back online Jazz was in the process of slaughtering about a dozen Decepticon guards. When he finished, he didn't seem to recognize Bluestreak. He collapsed on his way to the door, and when he got back up he seemed normal again."

The room was quiet as the three mechs thought.

"He was not aggressive toward Bluestreak?" Prowl clarified.

"Bluestreak didn't admit it, if he was." Ratchet glanced over what the sniper had actually said again. "And if he had been, I doubt Bluestreak would be in as good a shape as he is now." The CMO said frankly.

"No, he wouldn't." Prowl muttered.

"Did Bluestreak know?" Rung asked.

"No." Prowl shook his head distantly, staring at the datapad on Ratchet's desk without seeing it, lost in his own head. "Jazz didn't want him to." After another second, the tactician stood up. "Thank you, Ratchet. Keep me informed."

Ratchet only grunted, skimming over his data readouts again, as the Praxian left. "Not sure what the glitch expects to be able to _do_ about anything, but sure, why not." The CMO muttered to himself after the door closed. "It's not like patient confidentiality is a thing."

"Jazz did give permission for any and all medical information to be shared with Prowl." Rung pointed out. "And you share it with me, too."

Ratchet gave the slim mech a mild glare. "You're his psychologist."

"And Prowl was his psychologist before me. Honestly, Ratchet, even now Prowl understands Jazz's condition far better than I do. If it weren't for Prowl's efforts all these vorns, I doubt Jazz would have been doing so well at all."

The CMO ran a hand down his face tiredly. "Yeah, he's doing _great_. Got a hole in his core coding, but otherwise he's _great_."

"You know what I mean." Rung rebutted quietly. "If Jazz gets through this, it will be because of Prowl."

"That's a big 'if', Rung." Ratchet growled, giving the data readouts a dirty look. "We can't _fix_ this. Not entirely. You saw Neurosis' report on Jazz's condition before he split, and pre-existing damage in coding only makes new damage harder to fix—especially in core coding. We're not going to be able to undo the split."

"And if the alternate personality is prevalent or easily triggered and as violent as Bluestreak's report indicates…" Rung continued the thought.

"We may have just lost our special operations department commander." Ratchet finished darkly.

~0~

Monitors were beeping. Fluids were moving through an IV in his arm. New welds were itching across his frame. He analyzed the chemicals of the air passing through his vents, and listened to the soft murmurs across the room, picked up on the faint noise of other mechs' systems thrumming nearby, and he knew where he was. He even knew who was standing around, waiting for him to wake up. And that they had him in a private recovery room, which he appreciated.

"Jazz." Prowl said calmly.

"'Sup, Prowler." Jazz said back, leaving his optics offline. "How bad is it? How's Bluestreak?"

"Bluestreak is fine. He's already back on light duty, and anxious to speak to you."

Jazz slowly booted up his optics, his spark sinking. "How long's it been?" he asked quietly.

"Five orns." Prowl told him, just as quietly. "We wanted to be sure you were stable before we brought you back online."

Jazz tilted his helm to the side, eying up the two medics and psychologist standing on the other side of the recovery room, well out of danger. He sighed, offlining his visor again. The lights were a little brighter than he liked.

"Nothin' personal, Neurosis, but'cher kinda th'last person I wanna see right when I wake up in th'med-bay."

The mnemo-surgeon smiled sympathetically. "You're going to like what I have to say even less, I'm afraid."

Jazz sighed again, rolling his head to indicate the medics should get over there and get on with it. The other three mechs stepped up to the inclined berth, hovering somberly over the mech.

"You split, Jazz." Prowl stated without preamble.

"Yeah." Jazz agreed. "I figured. How bad?"

"That really depends on your definition of it." Neurosis took over, encouraged by the saboteur's passiveness. "It was a stage 9 split, initially—almost complete, and very clean, which is both a good and bad thing. Good, because it leads to less personality conflict later. Bad because it's nearly impossible to repair."

Jazz took a deep, somewhat shaky vent, and nodded. "Initially?" he queried.

"Yes, there was an interesting constraint to the split that I've actually never encountered before." Neurosis admitted. "Possibly brought on by your previous, erm, condition. We didn't notice it until just this last orn. You see, Jazz, your personality core split nearly in half, but it's the part that didn't quite sever that led me to classify your condition under stage 8."

"Get t'the point, Neurosis," Jazz ordered flatly.

"Sorry. Your emotional core seems to have retained some integrity, more than any other portion of your personality coding. It's not very much, but it's something we might be able to build on."

Jazz cocked his helm slightly. "What're we talkin'?"

"Erm… Well, there are several factors involved in rebuilding core coding that are difficult to predict, but… vorns. And only partial reconstruction. Currently, I would estimate roughly 30% of your personality coding can be cross-linked, allowing your self-repair to build off the framework. It won't be enough to undo the split, but it may help diminish some of the effects."

"I'm hearin' a discomforting amount of conjecture in there, Neuro." Jazz pointed out lowly.

Neurosis shrugged helplessly. "Every processor and every split is different and unique, Jazz. They all respond differently to treatment. It's an art as much as a science."

"Well… That sucks. I'm goin' back t'rechargin'."

Rung and Neurosis looked surprised. Ratchet rolled his optics, opening his mouth to snap at the mech. Prowl held up a hand, silently requesting the CMO let him handle this. Jazz was already asleep by then, as far as they could tell.

"Jazz, you can't rest until you've made some decisions or talked to Bluestreak." Prowl decreed.

"Well, I don' wanna do either o'those things, so nah." Jazz muttered.

"I'll go tell Bluestreak you don't want to talk to him, then." Prowl turned to the door. He was just about to open it when Jazz hissed.

"I hate you." He growled, finally onlining his optics to glare up at the bright lights. "Fine! What do I gotta decide right this moment?"

Neurosis edged away from the minibot's venomous glare, but Prowl returned to his side without hesitation, the subtle expression on his face and the set of his doorwings reeking smugness. He nodded for Neurosis and Ratchet to begin explaining. Jazz pouted the entire time. It seemed he wasn't paying any attention. When they were done describing the treatment plans available, Prowl turned to him and summarized all three options in one sentence.

Jazz sat up and peered at the flowcharts, arms folded over his chest. "So… We know next ta nothin' 'bout this other personality. You're accountin' for that, right?"

Neurosis nodded. "Of course, once we know more the plan might change, but the sooner we can begin a treatment the more we will be able to do."

Jazz sighed. "K." he contemplated a moment longer, and then pointed. "Fast track. Sooner we get this sorted, sooner I c'n go back t'work."

None of them said anything. Neither medic hesitated as they nodded and promptly started working out a schedule, but the correction hung heavy in the room, anyway.

 _If_. _If_ you can go back to work.

Jazz flopped back on the inclined berth, letting out a long vent. Rung smiled and said something encouraging before leaving. Ratchet told him to stay, and recharging was a good idea, and that he and Neurosis would let him know once they had details before they also left. Prowl didn't move until everyone was gone, and then promptly dimmed the lights to something he knew Jazz would be more comfortable with.

The saboteur rubbed at his face tiredly as Prowl stepped back over to the berth.

"Blue actually waitin' outside?" Jazz asked.

"Yes."

Jazz sighed, looking up at his friend with a vulnerability that no one else ever saw. "Did I hurt 'im?" He asked.

"No." Prowl assured him softly, rotating his doorwings comfortingly.

"Thank Primus." Jazz muttered, offlining his visor. There was silence for almost a breem before Jazz spoke again. "What'm I gonna tell 'im, Prowl?"

"The truth would be good. He won't think any less of you for it, Jazz."

They'd had this conversation. Too many times.

Jazz just sighed again. "Maybe. But… Not right now?" he pleaded. "Dunno how, since I spent th'last few orns in stasis, but 'm just really tired right now."

Prowl put a hand on his shoulder. "Then rest. I'll let Bluestreak know."

The Polyhexian gave a half-smile. "Thanks, Prowler."

"You're welcome, Jazz."

~0~

Jazz had to claim exhaustion more times than he liked over the next few orns, mainly due to the number of visitors he had. He couldn't say no to Optimus or the medics or Prowl, didn't to Mirage and most of the rest of his department because he needed to stay up to date even if he couldn't go back on duty, and wouldn't for a few others because he felt bad for turning too many people away.

He did talk to Bluestreak within an orn of first waking up, but it wasn't anything substantial. The young mech asked him how he was, earnestly worried, and Jazz told him—honestly—that he was still tired and didn't remember what had happened. Bluestreak rambled on about how worried he'd been and how frightened—not that he was frightened of Jazz, of course not, just the way he'd been acting had been so strange and everything and he'd had no idea what to do or why it was happening—and Jazz had quietly apologized for everything he'd been put through, including his…episode.

Bluestreak left very content that Jazz was going to be alright. Jazz laid down, signaling the med-bay roster to report him as unavailable, and stared at the ceiling for a long time.

It took him another deca-cycle to get out of the med-bay. He had appointments every other orn for treatments or check-ups, but he made sure everybody saw him around and nobody saw him go in for them. The less people knew… the better. It took him almost another deca-cycle after his release before he realized something.

~0~

Prowl's office door burst open. Jazz came flying across the room, visor bright. Prowl almost punched him for rushing at him like that, but refrained.

"PROWL!" Jazz bellowed excitedly. Prowl's doorwings flared, jabbing outward. Jazz ran straight into his desk, sprawling across it in his excitement and scattering the datapads on it.

"Jazz!" Prowl snapped.

Jazz held up his favorite knife, almost victoriously. "So get this, mech, I'm stuck in th'med-bay fer a deca-cycle, yeah? An' I'm under a lot of stress 'cause everythin' sucks, yeah? An' what do I do when I'm stressed?" The words came out so fast they were almost on top of each other.

Prowl glanced at the knife suspiciously, and then at Jazz, even more suspiciously. "What or who did you stab?" he demanded.

Jazz rolled over and sat up on the desk, grinning. "Tha's the thing, mech. Nothin'." He held up the knife again. "I haven't even pulled this thing outta my subspace since I woke up. Not while I was talkin' ta Rung, or Ratchet an' Neurosis, or Optimus or anybody else." Understanding dawned on Prowl, making Jazz grin wider. "An' ya know what else I haven't even _wanted_ t'do?" He flipped the knife into subspace, holding up his hand to count off on his fingers. "Haven't even had th'urge t'find some drugs, go base-jumping, an' I haven't had anythin' bigger than a mild mood swing since I woke up." He held up a finger, grin falling to a serious frown. "However, I'm still tired fer reasons that can't be explained, an' I've been craving a variety of things, an' concentratin's still an issue. But _come on_!" He threw his hands out, grin returning. "Out of all my destructive impulses, can we agree those're the least dangerous?!"

Prowl was smiling as well by now. "That's wonderful, Jazz. Have you told Rung?"

Jazz rolled off the desk and drug one of the chairs over. " _Literally_ just occurred t'me that these things weren't happenin'. You're th'first person I've talked to."

Prowl's doorwings eased back and down as he reordered the datapads on his desk. By the time he had finished picking up the few that had made it to the floor, he had a slight frown on his face. Jazz wilted in his chair dramatically when he saw it.

"Noooooo, you're gonna ruin it with logic, aren'tcha?" he complained.

Prowl's doorwings flared in silent apology. "I'm only concerned it won't last, or that the trade-off won't be worthwhile."

Jazz sighed, making himself comfortable. "Fair points, as much as I hate ya for it," he admitted.

"Additionally, I'd like to point out that, if _you_ don't have the impulses anymore, where did the damage go?"

Jazz nodded, looking thoughtful. They'd learned a long time ago how to talk about these things without spawning damaging conflict. "Coulda been covered up by th'new damage. Maybe half went t'the other personality an' half stayed with me?" he shrugged. "Best case scenario."

"And worst-case scenario?" Prowl prompted softly.

Jazz turned to look at him. "Th'other personality has it, an' they'll be all th'most dangerous things I ever was. It's possible, judging from Blue's account." He frowned. "I haven't been triggered in all this time. That good or bad?"

Prowl shrugged. "Could be the secondary personality is difficult to trigger, not triggered often, or… you simply haven't had the right trigger."

Jazz stared at him for a long moment, but sometimes Jazz stared when he was thinking. And sometimes he got offended if he thought you weren't paying attention when he was done thinking, so Prowl just stared back, thinking as well.

"I was angry an' afraid when I split," Jazz finally admitted quietly. "But if it takes somethin' as big as that t'trigger it, it prob'ly won't happen too often."

Prowl nodded. "We can hope."

Jazz sprang up with a grin. "Well, I'll let ya get back t'work. Thanks fer th'warnin's. Hopefully Ratch' an' Neuro don't bring 'em back while they're fixin' me, but if they do let's hope it makes the other guy less nasty." He waved on his way out the door, and Prowl sighed, shaking his head once he was gone.

Too many mecha had asked him, over the vorns, if raising Bluestreak had been as exhausting as it seems it should have been. He'd always told them no, but he'd never elaborated. Truth was, raising Jazz had been far more exhausting than anything else he could ever be presented with. Not that Bluestreak _wasn't_ exhausting, in his own ways. Because he was.

And Prowl loved them both dearly.

~0~

It was another deca-cycle before Mirage turned to Jazz suspiciously while they were working on paperwork and processing some recent intel.

"Why does Ratchet still have you on medical leave?" he asked point blank.

Jazz shrugged without looking up. "Lingerin' effects. Ratch's just bein' cautious, doesn't think I should be out in th'field 'til they're cleared up."

Mirage hummed, studying his boss. Jazz finally looked up to meet his gaze expectantly. "Anything we need to be concerned about?" the ex-noble asked pointedly.

Mirage had always been one of the most suspicious of him, ever since he'd joined Jazz's unit. His ability to see what the head of special operations kept so carefully hidden had been one of the factors that led to the mech's promotion to second in command of the department—even if that meant Jazz had to work that much harder to keep his situation under wraps. A casual 'no,' was on the tip of his tongue, but then Jazz hesitated.

 _If_ this turned into worst-case-scenario, his department would need to know so they would know how to handle him. If Mirage thought he was lying, he would do what any good spy would and go digging for the truth, and being as good as he was he would most likely find it. If he hadn't already.

"Not yet," he decided to say. "We're not sure. I'll keep ya posted."

Mirage nodded, going back to his datapad without further comment. Jazz's spark relaxed, fairly confident the mech wouldn't pry, but frowned to himself. Those questions were going to start coming up more and more often as time went on. Most mecha were going to respect his privacy if that was the answer he gave them, but they would still wonder. This treatment plan was going to take almost a vorn and a half, assuming nothing went wrong. That was a long time for him to look and act normal and still be on medical leave.

He sighed to himself, his mood dropping a bit. But then he pushed the thoughts aside. There wasn't anything he could do about it except tough it out. So that was what he would do.

~0~

Ratchet put him on light duty after a few arguments, but absolutely forbade him from leaving the base.

"K," Jazz said.

As he left the med-bay he checked the calendar, the one that let the officers know who was going where and when, and grinned to himself. He shouldn't. He knew that. Ratchet was going to be furious. But he was bored and tired of these walls. He hadn't been outside in too long. So he poked his helm into Prowl's office to let him know he was back on light duty, and then found somewhere near the docks to wait.

A few joors later, a shuttle was getting prepped for a short flight out to one of Iacon's outskirt bases. He slipped on without a problem. He waited another few breems until they took off, and chuckled to himself quietly. It was too easy, it really was.

When they landed, he waited for the other three passengers to exit before slipping out of his hiding spot and stepping out after them. "So," he said. Prowl's doorwings went stiff. "What're we up to all th'way out here?" he asked gleefully.

The two junior tacticians with Prowl blinked at him. "Oh, I didn't know you were accompanying us, sir," one of them greeted him.

Prowl put a hand to his comm. "Ratchet, Jazz stowed away on our shuttle."

"Nooooooooooooooo!" Jazz cried, grabbing his friend's arm and hanging off of it. "He wasn' s'posed t'find out 'til I got back!"

"North border base," Prowl reported, ignoring the minibot with practiced ease.

"C'mon, Prowler, don' send me back, m'bored!" he pleaded. "Have mercy!"

The junior tacticians just watched the scene play out, one amused and the other a little incredulous. Apparently, there was no maturity requirement for being a department head.

Prowl gave a longsuffering sigh, glaring down at the Polyhexian. "Ratchet, please calm down. I can't get him back on the shuttle if he doesn't want to go. I'll watch him, make sure he stays out of trouble, and we'll be back before his next appointment. I promise. Yes, I'll tell him. Thank you. Prowl out."

Jazz grinned while Prowl glared at him for a moment after the comm ended. "You owe me," he finally said.

Jazz sprang to his feet. "Yes, I do! Yer th'best, Prowler!"

Prowl sighed again and finally started for the base proper, where the base's primary tactician was waiting for them, looking bemused. Jazz skipped along beside him. "So, what're we up to?" he asked again.

" _You_ are going to behave and stay close. _We_ are performing a tactical diagnostic on the base."

"K," Jazz said.

He did as he was told, and when they got back the orn after Ratchet put him back on medical leave, but it had been worth it. It didn't slow him down much, anyway. He was basically back to work, coordinating his operatives, receiving intel and reporting it to whoever needed to know, going to officers meetings, basically everything except going on field missions.

By ten deca-orns after he split, with his impulses still relatively non-existent, no episodes since and everything going rather well, Jazz had almost convinced himself that he didn't have anything to worry about. But that, of course, was too much to hope for.


	4. Ricochet

AN: Sorry I'm late, there's been SO MANY THINGS happening over here!

Also, fair warning, this is the last chapter I have ready and I have no clue how long the next chapter is going to take. I am so sorry, but you've probably got a month of waiting ahead of you. : (

* * *

His mind felt blurry when he woke up, but it always did after a repair session. The feeling faded as he waited for Ratchet and Neurosis to finish post-repair operations. By the time they let him go, it was gone entirely. He heard Ratchet sigh in aggravation when the medic turned around and he had disappeared, but he just smirked to himself as he made his way through the vents. The fewer people who saw him come and go, the better. Maybe Ratchet didn't care, but he did.

He poked his helm into Prowl's office just to annoy the Praxian, then made the rounds. He stifled his snickers at Red Alert's twitching as he stared at the Security Director. He dropped in to deliver a datapad to Optimus which the Prime took without comment. He moved some things Wheeljack was using and grinned at the engineer's muttering as he searched for them. Finally, the saboteur startled Mirage when he arrived back at the special ops common room, dropping out of the vent next to the mech as he sipped some energon and read his datapad. The ex-noble jumped. He dropped his energon, reaching for his knife. Jazz caught the cube. Mirage canceled the subspace pull, took the cube back, and made an angry noise at the grinning minibot before storming away. Jazz laughed to himself.

Then the base alarms went off.

The common room flooded with operatives instantly. Jazz didn't move, waiting for the familiar stream of data and commands to start coming through. It never did. Mirage was the one who started giving out orders a moment later, and Jazz frowned at him. Several of his mecha glanced his way before scattering. Jazz got on the command channel, but he didn't announce himself. He just listened, and got himself into a position to help—medical leave be damned.

It was a wasteful frontal assault on Iacon's perimeter bases. Nothing to worry about. Jazz listened in for a few joors, waiting to be useful, but nothing came up that he needed to address. He was about to sign off and go do some meditating, because this was stressing him out more than it should, it seemed, when something changed.

The base slammed into lockdown. Jazz started moving, syncing with Red Alert's security grid to track the sensor hits. They were few and far between, but not far enough to escape him. It still took him half the time he spent catching up to the infiltrator to figure out where the glitch was going.

Straight to tactical.

By the time Jazz overrode the door and burst in, there was energon on the floor and the tacticians had knocked over chairs and desks to give themselves some cover. The Decepticon was nowhere to be seen, but Jazz could _feel_ them in the room somewhere.

/Ev'rybody alright?/ he asked silently.

/Alive,/ Prowl returned, failing to hide the hitch in his mental voice.

/Well, _some_ body ain't gonna be, soon's I find 'em./

He walked in, as if he was unaware that there was still a threat present. He didn't have to wait long before one of the tacticians yelped a warning. The bladed chassis coming at him was not easy to dodge. He didn't escape unscathed, but the pain only sharpened his focus. It seemed to make thinking so much easier. It always did.

His own knife was in hand before the initial strike was done with. He struck back, pouncing on his adversary with a snarl. She—she? Yeah, that was definitely a femme—got away from him. She dove into the tacticians' barricade, lashing out at anyone close enough. She expected he wouldn't want to take the fight into the crowd, that he would be cautious. The tacticians themselves were smart enough not to try and shoot her, for fear of hitting each other. None but Prowl could match her in close quarters, but he wasn't fit to fight at the moment.

Jazz dove after her, a growl in his engine. The sharpness of his mind should have seemed unusual to him right then, but he was too angry to notice, too intent on eliminating this threat. The tacticians scrambled away, Smokescreen dragging Prowl around the table as fast as he could. He wasn't fast enough. A thin blade shot out of the assassin, instants before Jazz reached her. Her aim was good. It sank straight into Prowl's chest. Jazz only saw it out of the corner of his vision.

Smokescreen didn't see the transition. He was too busy trying to stop the bleeding. But a couple of the tacticians did—the ones who were watching Jazz closely. He froze. His visor flickered; three times, rapidly. Then it went dark and slid up, revealing bright red optics. The growl in his engine dropped to a low, warning note. The assassin was halfway to the vents by the time Jazz moved again.

He threw his knife as she leaped to the ceiling. She was a blur of motion, and somehow the knife hit her. By the time she landed on the floor, crying out, Jazz was there, and he was merciless.

Smokescreen looked up at the energon-chilling shriek that tore through the room. Several tacticians screamed as well. When the tactical second in command took in the scene, for one instant he thought there were two of them, now. The next instant he realized the larger one was _Jazz_ , and his chassis froze in abject terror.

Prowl grabbed his shoulder, pulling himself up into a sitting position, and Smokescreen couldn't move to protest. The department commander took one look at the scene.

/Get out, everybody out!/ he barked. Half of the department, who still had use of their faculties, had grabbed the nearest injured comrade and were already out the door. There was only a handful of them left, staring in shock at the horrifying scene playing out in their headquarters. Smokescreen tried to take Prowl with him, but the mech shoved him away, fighting to his feet.

/Now,/ he growled when the younger Praxian hesitated.

With one last glance at the bloody mess Jazz was creating, Smokescreen left. It took him full breems, once he was out of the room, for his shaking to die down.

Inside the room, Prowl halted the security teams with a single order, brooking no argument, and alerted Ratchet, Neurosis, and Rung that it had finally happened. He leaned heavily against a computer terminal as he waited. The assassin had been silent after that first shriek. She was long dead, but that didn't seem to matter to Jazz. He was literally shredding the chassis into ribbons of metal. It was gruesome and unnecessary, and almost looked obsessive compulsive from where Prowl was struggling to stay on his feet.

"Jazz," he finally called.

The mech whirled and froze, the warning growl an unending tone vibrating his chassis. His front was dripping energon. The puddle was only growing around the dead Decepticon. Jazz didn't seem to recognize Prowl, but after a moment the snarl faded from his face. He contemplated the Praxian silently, and then turned and went back to his compulsive mutilation.

Prowl mustered his strength and straightened. Energon was dripping out from under his armor. The blade had pierced several important energon lines, _barely_ missing his spark chamber from what he could gather. He didn't have long before he would go into stasis from the damage, but he needed to be sure this was dealt with properly.

"Stop," he ordered sternly.

Jazz froze. He didn't look at Prowl. After a long second he stabbed his knife into the body again, and then slowly turned to look at the other mech. When he got to his feet, it was with the fluid grace of a trained killer, of a predator. Prowl refused to back down from the obvious threat in his friend, but he had to put a hand on the terminal for balance. His vision was starting to blur. He couldn't feel his legs very well.

Jazz glared at him darkly for another second, and then sneered. "What did you say to me?" he demanded.

Prowl would have been surprised, but he was too focused on staying upright. "I said stop, Jazz," he repeated quietly.

"That's not my name," the minibot snarled.

Prowl's legs gave out and he collapsed. There was a puddle of energon beneath him as well, now, and his vision wouldn't focus. The errors scrolling past his HUD were getting more urgent, with prompts to enter stasis coming more and more frequently. He fought it all back.

The mech sharing Jazz's chassis took a step closer, a low, growling chuckle rolling out of him. But then suddenly, he collapsed as well, dropping into something that looked like stasis. Before Prowl could force himself to do anything, he clicked back online as quickly as he had gone out. Jazz didn't move for a long moment, and neither did Prowl, because he couldn't.

Jazz was starting to shake, his vents labored, when Prowl lost the battle with stasis.

~0~

Ratchet was right next to the doors, waiting for Prowl's signal. He queried the mech, and when he received no answer bit out a curse, reaching for the keypad. Before he could finish inputting his medical override, the doors swished open and Jazz was standing there. Covered in energon that wasn't his. Shaking hard enough that he was audibly rattling. Visor bright enough that he could have been overcharged.

Ratchet's immediate diagnosis was shock. He'd never seen Jazz in shock.

"First Aid!" he barked. His apprentice was on his heels as he strode through the door, grabbing Jazz to drag him back into the room. Rung slipped in behind them, gently guiding Jazz off to the other side of the room with First Aid while Ratchet rolled Prowl over and set to work. Once he had stabilized the Praxian, he called for a stretcher and a cleanup crew. He walked over to where Jazz was sitting against a terminal as far away as he could be and out of sight of the hideous mess he'd made. He wasn't in shock anymore—at least, not as badly in shock—and Rung was speaking to him softly while First Aid just sat beside him silently. Ratchet wasn't sure if the saboteur even knew they were there.

He knelt down in front of the minibot, flicking his helm. Jazz looked up at him, but there was something off about him, an attention that was obviously missing. "Prowl's going to be fine. He just needs a transfusion," the CMO assured him. "We're taking him to the med-bay, and you're coming too."

"Okay," Jazz whispered. The door opened for a couple junior medics and a stretcher, and Ratchet went to help get Prowl onto it while Rung and First Aid got Jazz to his feet. The hallway fell silent the moment they stepped out. Tactical was back into the battle, most of them occupied, but some weren't occupied enough not to stare at Jazz as he shuffled unsteadily down the hall. They hadn't even made it out of the intersection before Jazz leaned over and purged his tanks onto the floor.

Ratchet sighed and came back, picking the minibot up to carry him the rest of the way. Neurosis was already prepping the proper equipment, so Ratchet started putting him into stasis, and Jazz didn't protest any of it.

The med-bay was grimly quiet as the medics worked on Prowl. Soon enough, he was coming out of stasis. The first thing he did was get back on the command channel to check on the battle. A second later he turned to First Aid. "Jazz?" he asked.

First Aid gestured to one of the operating cathedrals. "Ratchet and Neurosis are with him now."

"How was he?"

First Aid just shook his helm, optic band dim.

~0~

Rung sighed, finally giving up, and stepped out of the room. He shook his head at Prowl and Ratchet. "He's not responding to me, either. I'm not sure what to do."

Ratchet growled something under his breath, glaring at Prowl. Prowl sighed, reaching up to rub at his chevron. "I'll try again," he decided, and moved past the psychiatrist and into the ICU beyond.

Jazz was on the berth, several cables connecting him to very specialized machinery. He was still as a statue, as if he were in stasis, but his optic band was lit up brightly. He was certainly online, and had been for joors.

Prowl stopped next to the berth to stare down at his friend disapprovingly. "So, this is how you end, after all these vorns," he said quietly. "And here I had thought we'd made you stronger than any of this." The tactician sighed when there was no answer, sitting down in the nearby chair. There was silence in the room for a long, long few breems.

"I'm not going to let you kill yourself, Jazz," the Praxian stated quietly. "I would not allow it then, and I will not allow it now. You are worth saving now just as much as you were worth saving then. You're going to get up and we're going to figure this out just like we did the first time. The only point at which you lose this war is when you stop getting up."

Prowl left it at that, and waited. For almost half a joor. Ratchet commed asking if he was getting anywhere and he ignored the CMO. This prompted some nasty cursing in his direction. He ignored that as well.

"Will he come back?" Jazz wondered finally, his voice shaky and quiet. "If I move, will he come back?"

"Yes," Prowl answered bluntly. "But if you don't move, you will be as good as dead. And you are worth more than that."

Jazz slowly turned to look at him, but this time it was the movement of a terrified prey animal, not a confident predator. "But is he?"

Prowl held his gaze for a moment, considering his words. "No. But you are not him."

"Naw, we jus' share a chassis. An' a processor. An' he might take it over at any moment an' mutilate th'nearest person," Jazz countered flippantly. "That ain't so bad, right?"

"Jazz,"

The minibot shot into a sitting position, yanking the cables attached to his helm, though he didn't seem to notice. "THIS IS SO BAD, PROWL, ARE YA NOT COMPREHENDING HOW BAD THIS IS?! I could murder ANYONE at ANY MOMENT, do ya not realize that?!"

"I do. But the facts are that you have always had that ability, and simply never acted on it. You could have done any of us bodily harm at any point in the past, and you have fought back the compulsion to do so for all of us at some point or another, have you not?"

"This is _different_ , Prowl, this ain't a compulsion!"

"Even with Optimus, have you not?"

"This is another person we're talkin' about! It ain't as simple as that!"

" _Even with Optimus._ Is that not true?"

Jazz slumped, putting his head in his hands. "Yes, even Optimus!" he cried. "Even him," he whimpered.

"Before we met, would you have stabbed Optimus Prime under those exact circumstances?" Prowl asked.

"Yes," Jazz admitted miserably.

"But you did not, because you learned how to be better. I taught you how to be better. Why are you assuming I can't teach this other personality as well?"

Jazz didn't move for a long moment, and then he tilted his helm. "Show me th'footage," he demanded flatly.

Prowl pursed his lips, but brought up the security camera footage on his pad and handed it over. Jazz watched, rocking back with a quiet keen as the video played. When it was over, he was quiet again until he slowly held the pad up.

"I _wanted_ t'change, Prowl. This guy… does not look like the sort who _wants_ t'change."

"Perhaps not," Prowl admitted, standing up and taking the pad back. "But we won't know until we try." He put a hand on his friend's shoulder. "You _cannot_ lose unless you give up, Jazz."

Jazz looked up and studied him for a long moment, and then nodded. "Alright. Get everybody in here, then. We got some things t'talk about."

~0~

Nobody went back into tactical until the mess had been cleaned up and everything put back in its place. Prowl had to send some of his tacticians on mental health holidays because of the stain that was left on the floor. Everybody else who had been there for the event was quiet and at least slightly uncomfortable, though nobody was really talking about it. Prowl didn't hold it against any of them, though he did try to keep everybody on task.

Jazz disappeared from the rest of base overnight. He refused to leave the med-bay or have any visitors. Optimus talked to him, but that didn't help much. Special Ops was asking questions, but the answers they were getting were vague and unhelpful. Prowl had Red Alert classify the camera footage of what had happened, but it wasn't long before the security director came back and let him know someone had managed to hack in and get ahold of it. He was working on identifying the perpetrator. Prowl had sighed, thanked him for the heads up, and left right then to confront Jazz's department.

The special ops mecha knew what they were doing, carefully giving nothing away as they asked Prowl the same questions they always had been. But they'd all seen the footage. And they all knew Prowl knew they'd seen the footage. More importantly, they all knew something was seriously wrong with their department head.

Finally, after playing that game for a while, Prowl sighed, reaching up to rub at his chevron. The department waited in expectant silence. "I know you have the security footage of what happened," he stated bluntly.

"What—"

" _Don't_ try to deny it," Prowl interrupted, glaring at the 'Bot who had spoken. "Do not share it with anybody else. We are doing our best to contain and rectify the situation. For Jazz's sake, please do not make it worse than it already is."

"We want to help, Prowl," Mirage spoke up quietly, his golden gaze intent. "We can't do that when we're out of the loop."

Prowl sighed again. "I understand that, but it is not my place to share the details. If you can convince Jazz, then by all means, proceed. Until then, please be patient." He nodded to dismiss them, turning to go.

"Will he be able to lead us again?" Mirage asked bluntly.

Prowl turned back and held the ex-noblemech's gaze for a long moment. "That is uncertain, at the moment," he admitted quietly. "But I am hopeful."

Mirage nodded, and Prowl decided he'd better go to the med-bay and warn Jazz that his department wasn't going to let this go.

~0~

Deca-orns passed. More and more people started wondering what had happened to Jazz. Rumors started up, everything from he'd had a psychotic break (probably the most accurate) to he'd gone on a long-term away mission to he'd ended up dead somehow and the command frame was scrambling to figure out what to do about it. Special Ops kept their mouths shut, as far as Prowl could tell, and so did his department… mostly. He suspected the prevalence and accuracy of the psychotic break rumor had originated from his mecha, but he couldn't pin it down so he had to let it go. The damage was already done, anyway.

Jazz's repair sessions were going well. He was showing a lot of progress, better even than Neurosis had hoped for. But the mech's confidence was shattered. He didn't trust himself to be around anybody other than the medics, Prowl, and sometimes Rung. He got better as the deca-orns went on, sometimes leaving the med-bay to visit Prowl's office, but Prowl could see that his friend had little hope for this situation resolving itself. He was still wondering why they were even bothering to try, at this point.

Prowl did his best to convince him otherwise, but it didn't seem to be working.

By the time the medics were halfway through the treatment Jazz hadn't been triggered again, but he was still terrified of the idea to the point of paralysis at times. Prowl was starting to lose patience with the attitude. They needed more data on this other personality. They needed to prove he could be trained, that he was perhaps getting better the more Ratchet and Neurosis healed the schism in Jazz's coding. The problem was, they didn't really _want_ to trigger him.

Still, as time went on, Prowl knew they were going to have to. They needed to know, if Jazz was ever going to be able to lead his department again. So Prowl started talking to the medics. They agreed that it was possible to medically trigger the alternate personality, not with perfect results, but they could do it. They weren't sure if it would make Jazz easier to trigger in the future or not, though.

Prowl went to Jazz with the idea and Jazz had a _meltdown_.

"You can't do that, he'll kill you!" the saboteur yelled, already starting to shake.

"We need to know more about him, Jazz. I can't train him if he only shows up once a vorn, and you can't go back to work until we're certain he is not an unmanageable threat," Prowl tried to explain calmly.

"But he'll kill you, an' then what?!"

"He was not aggressive toward Bluestreak and he was not aggressive toward me. I doubt he would attempt to kill me, and even so it would be a carefully controlled session and I doubt he would overpower me before anyone could interfere," Prowl countered.

"But what if he did?" Jazz demanded. He was getting more agitated by the second. Prowl stood up, reaching out to try and calm the mech down, but Jazz recoiled. And then his visor flickered, three times, rapidly.

Prowl hit the magnetic restraint controls on the berth, stifling the inappropriate burst of amusement at the irony. Jazz went still, his visor retracted, red optics bright and face tinged with suspicion. Prowl straightened and met his gaze calmly. He notified Ratchet and Neurosis and Rung, and then sat down.

"We need to talk," he told the mech sharing Jazz's chassis.

The mech rolled his optics, turning away from the Praxian to study the room. Prowl let him be distracted for a moment, deciding where to start. He'd been contemplating how to go about this for some time, but this was rather unexpected and not in the venue he'd planned on. So he opted to start simple.

"What is your name?"

The mech turned back to him, studied him for a long moment, and then started to grin. It was not friendly.

"It's… Ricochet."


	5. Where Worlds Meet (again)

AN: HEY GUYS GUESS WHO'S NOT DEAD

its me. And also this story.

I AM SO SORRY FOR THE DELAY. Thank you to everybody who is still here, and to all my reviewers!

Sadly, I cannot and will not promise any more alacrity in future updates. I'm kind of in a dead zone right now where I know where I am and where I want to end up and getting there is just... a big blank stretch. : / Sorry guys.

Anyway, enjoy the chapter. : )

* * *

Ricochet didn't last very long for that first conversation. Past telling Prowl his name, he seemed quite disinterested in talking. He ignored the tactician while Prowl tried to get him to talk until he finally glared at him, growled, and slumped over unconscious.

Jazz woke up in an awkward position with his aft magnetized to the medical berth and knew what had happened instantly. He spat at his friend to get out, his visor bright in anger and fear, and Prowl had complied. Ratchet and Neurosis were the only mecha Jazz would talk to for more than a deca-orn afterward. Prowl spoke with the medics some more, pouring over the footage of the episode with them and Rung, picking apart Ricochet's mannerisms and actions. It was still very little to go on, but it was enough for Prowl to have a plan.

He left Jazz alone as long as he felt he should. He hoped Jazz would come around on his own in that time, but the stubborn minibot did not. The equally stubborn tactician was not deterred.

"Jazz, we need to talk about this."

Jazz shifted and Ratchet growled at him. The saboteur glanced at the medics giving him a post-repair checkup and then slid a glare over at the tactician. "So we're playin' dirty now? Fine. Whatever. You can talk all ya want, I ain't changin' my mind."

Prowl stepped forward, careful to stay out of the medics'. "Regardless, we need to talk. Ratchet, Neurosis, Rung and I have all reviewed the data we have so far. You will not be permitted to return to active duty until we can honestly report to the Prime that Ricochet is not an unacceptable risk to other Autobots. I strongly believe that, with some training, that will be the case. The sooner you overcome your fear of him, the sooner you can go back to work."

"An' your plan t'do this is, what, lock yerself inna room with 'im an' hope he doesn't kill ya?" Jazz demanded. "'Cause I am not comfortable with that plan."

"There is more to it than that, Jazz, and you know it. It will be a controlled environment and there will be backup on standby."

"So he c'n kill them too? Perfect."

"You are assuming an inborn desire to kill everyone he interacts with, but that is not the experience anyone has had with him, Jazz. He showed no interest in harming Bluestreak, or myself either time I interacted with him. The two times he was aggressive it was in response to some sort of threat—and yes, he may have been overly violent in eliminating those threats, but that violence did not extend to anyone else. Besides which, I am confident that Ricochet's hand to hand skill is not more developed than yours, in which case you know I can at least hold him off long enough for backup to arrive. You are overreacting."

"Fine, maybe he's _not_ better at fightin' that me, but I'll betcha he's a _dirtier_ fighter." Jazz tilted his helm up, visor bright, daring Prowl to argue.

Prowl shrugged his doorwings. "I wouldn't be surprised if that were the case. I still doubt he could overpower me before backup could intervene."

"Alright, say he got away from ya, then. What about that?"

"Controlled environment," Prowl countered easily. "We can seal off a training room, lock your subspace, and even put you in stasis cuffs before we trigger Ricochet, if we feel the need."

"I don't wanna talk to you anymore," Jazz complained, rolling over on the berth and curling up like a youngling. Ratchet and Neurosis had been done with the checkup for a while now and were simply watching the verbal tennis match.

"Because you are running out of reasons to object?" Prowl accused with a smirk.

"Go away," Jazz ordered, putting his hands over his audios. "I'm not listening."

"Do you understand what will happen if you cannot be declared medically fit for duty?" Prowl asked quietly. Ratchet shot him a glance, frowning, obviously wondering if that was a good direction to take this conversation. Prowl ignored him.

"Lalala, not listening," Jazz insisted, but Prowl knew he was.

"You _will_ be discharged from service, Jazz," the tactician told him softly.

Jazz's entire chassis went tense, almost vibrating with energy. Ratchet and Neurosis both edged away, uncertain what the minibot's reaction would be. Prowl waved for them to leave, and after a moment they both did—but not without Ratchet giving him a warning glare, of course.

"Jazz," Prowl prompted, stepping over to put a hand on the mech's shoulder.

"Y'can't…" he started, a keen rising out of his engine. "Y'can't kick me out, Prowl, I don' got a home outside o'th'Autobots, ya _know_ that. I ain't got anywhere else t'go."

"I do know that, Jazz. That's why this is so important. We _have_ to do this to make you fit for duty again. Do you understand now?"

Jazz sighed deeply, uncurling and sitting up glumly. "Yeah, okay, do what ya gotta."

"Thank you, Jazz." Prowl patted his shoulder before pulling the guest chair over and sitting in it. "Any other thoughts on the matter?"

Jazz slumped, pouting at the mech. "Jus' be careful, alright?"

"Of course, Jazz."

There was a moment of silence between them. "How's my department doing?" Jazz wondered. Prowl gave a long-suffering sigh and Jazz grinned. "That good, huh?" he teased.

Prowl rolled his optics. "They refuse to let a day go by where they don't nag me for information and updates. For a group of spies, assassins, and saboteurs, they're quite impatient."

The minibot laughed, slapping him on the shoulder. "They just ain't used t'not gettin' th'info they want, that's all."

"Well then, perhaps someone should give it to them," Prowl suggested with a raised optic ridge.

"No, not until we got it figured out," Jazz countered.

Prowl sighed softly, but nodded, getting to his feet. "I will fight them back a little longer, then."

"Thanks Prowl, yer th'mech," Jazz said as the Praxian headed for the door.

Prowl turned back, smirking a tiny bit. "You're welcome, Jazz."

~0~

The preparations had been made. The medics had done what they needed to do, as delicately as they could manage it. Prowl watched as they set Jazz down on the training room floor, checking him again to be sure his weapons and subspace were properly locked. His visor was already retracted. In theory, Ricochet would be in control when he woke up.

"Good luck, Prowl," Rung murmured with a smile before heading out the door on the medics' heels. Optimus Prime simply put a hand on his shoulder before following them. Once they had exited the room, the door sealed.

/He should be coming online any minute,/ Ratchet assured him.

/Understood,/ Prowl returned, and went down on one knee to wait, watching the minibot closely.

The first hint of awareness was a vibration too minute for optic sensors to pick up—but not so for doorwing sensors. Nothing more happened for several seconds, and then Prowl vibrated his engine soothingly, as he would to calm Jazz.

"Ricochet, I know you're awake," he prompted. "We need to discuss some things."

Ricochet sat straight up, red optics lighting up sharply to glare at him. "Do I look like a youngling to you?" he demanded.

Prowl killed his engine noise immediately. "Indeed not," he murmured.

The mech's glare narrowed down to tiny slits. Then he rolled to his feet in the time it takes to blink. Prowl tensed, but the minibot only put his fists on his hips and looked around the room, his keen gaze raking over the smooth, blank walls. The vents had been welded shut. The projectors were all offline and the console was hidden in its locked position. Prowl had consulted extensively with Jazz's department—without telling them why, of course, which had driven them absolutely _mad_ —on how to black-ops-proof the room.

When they had finished the alterations, Mirage had taken a last look around and turned to the tactician.

"We can't guarantee it will hold Jazz indefinitely," he had said.

Prowl had arched an optic ridge at him. "Who said I needed it to?"

Mirage had huffed and walked away without another word. He was getting tired of their feigning-ignorance game. Prowl was too, honestly. Those special ops mecha were persistent slaggers.

Prowl hoped his guesstimations on Ricochet's abilities were accurate as the mech began to pace the edges of the room, running his hand along the wall. When it became obvious that Ricochet was going to ignore him again, he got to his feet and splayed his doorwings.

"Ricochet," he said firmly. "We need to talk."

Ricochet didn't respond, or pause his investigations. So Prowl intercepted him, putting himself directly in the minibot's path. When Ricochet moved to step around him, Prowl shifted to block him. Ricochet slowly looked up at the Praxian, his face twisted in a sneer. Prowl had seen that dangerous expression on so many gangsters in his time as a High Enforcer that it _almost_ made him react.

"You're in my way," Ricochet growled.

"Tell me where you came from," Prowl requested calmly.

"Yer the one talkin' to the medics, you tell me," he snarled, and turned to walk away.

Prowl stayed where he was. "Do you not know?"

"Don't really care, actually," Ricochet snapped.

"Do you remember anything before you were… you?"

"I don' remember signing up for an interrogation!"

"You did not. But you will not be permitted outside this room until I understand who you are and whether you are a threat to other people. It is in your best interest to cooperate, Ricochet."

Ricochet stopped, his engine vibrating in that warning growl, and glared across the room at Prowl. "And you're gonna make me?" he demanded lowly, stalking a few steps closer. His bright red optics were fixed on the Praxian like a predator's on his prey. Problem was, Prowl wasn't prey.

He lifted his doorwings again, trying to establish his authority without seeming aggressive. Ricochet's advance hesitated, and he eyed the appendages before growling quietly and going back to pacing the room.

"I can't make you. But I will continue to ask and annoy you until you answer. It is in your best interest to cooperate," Prowl reiterated.

The minibot turned on him like lightning. Prowl barely deflected the initial pounce. He tried to grab and pin the smaller mech, but Ricochet slithered out of his grasp like he was coated in oil.

/Prowl, do you need assistance?/ Optimus Prime's tense voice came over the comm.

/No,/ he replied shortly.

Ricochet came at him again with a snarl, anger in every flared plate and the sharpness of his optics. He landed a few blows, though Prowl expertly redirected most of the energy. The tactician waited a bit, for the mech to wear himself out or give up, but when it became obvious that neither would happen he made his move.

A swift return strike left Ricochet off-balance. Prowl grabbed him and slammed him against the wall harshly. When Ricochet kept fighting, Prowl slammed his helm against the wall as hard as he dared. The minibot went still, freezing in place. Prowl didn't let go, wary of any deception.

Ricochet dropped offline suddenly. The Praxian sighed and placed him back in the center of the training room, returning to his position near the door, and settled down on one knee to wait again.

The Polyhexian clicked back online after several long breems. His visor engaged almost instantly and Prowl's doorwings relaxed. He got to his feet and stepped over as Jazz turned to him. The saboteur's gaze promptly found the damage on his friend's frame and he pursed his lips. Prowl offered a hand to help him up and he took it.

"Nothing I couldn't handle," the tactician assured him.

Jazz sighed and chose not to start that argument again. "What'd ya find out?" he wondered, putting a hand to his helm and grimacing at the dull throb in his processor.

"We shall have to review the footage before we can draw any conclusions, but it was an interesting encounter."

Jazz gave a noncommittal hum, and let the medics hurry him back to the med-bay for post-procedure checkups.

~0~

Jazz hit 'play' on the video for the eighth time and Prowl sighed, reaching out to take the datapad. Jazz twisted away from him, visor fixed on the screen. Prowl reached around him and Jazz held the pad as far away from the tactician as he could.

"Jazz," Prowl chided.

"Jus' one more time," Jazz shot back. "I jus' wanna see it one more time," he promised.

Prowl sighed, rolling his optics, but subsided back into his seat. Jazz stayed fixated on the video until it was over, and then hit 'play' again. The Praxian tried to snatch the pad away, but Jazz had a good grip on it and they both pulled at it, glaring at each other.

"Ya wanna hear what I gotta say, or not?" Jazz drawled, starting to grin.

Prowl let go and Jazz rocked back, giggling to himself. "A'right, lookit this," he prompted, pointing to the screen as the video played. They went through it slowly, pausing every few seconds so they could discuss Ricochet's behavior, trying to determine what he knew and how he thought. Prowl relaxed as they did, relieved that he'd finally gotten the saboteur on board enough to give some input. They wouldn't get far without the mech's support, and he was almost as good at reading people as Rung was, in his own way.

When they were done with the video, Prowl checked his chronometer and sighed, standing up. Jazz was jumping through the video again, muttering to himself as he kept thinking. He had a look of concentration on his face that he would get when presented with a puzzle to solve, and Prowl couldn't help but smile a tiny bit. Jazz's curiosity was starting to outweigh his fear, at least for the moment. That was good.

He put a hand on the minibot's shoulder and Jazz tilted his helm, acknowledging him without looking away from the pad. "Cooperate with the medics," Prowl reminded him. Jazz grunted and Prowl patted his shoulder before hurrying to tactical. He still had a job to do, after all.

~0~

/Prowl, do you know where Jazz is?/ Ratchet growled.

Prowl paused, withdrawing from the simulation and handing control over to Smokescreen for a moment. /No./

The CMO hissed several curses over the line. /I'm putting a tracker on that little fragger when we find him,/ he told the tactician.

/Not a terrible idea, with Ricochet in the mix,/ Prowl mused. Ratchet growled something at him and ended the comm. Prowl sighed silently and opened a new channel with Jazz.

/Sup, Prowler?/ Jazz greeted distractedly.

/Where are you?/

/My department. Why, Ratch' lookin' fer me already?/

/Yes. He's very upset./

Jazz chuckled. /Sorry. I'll pop back over there, soon's I'm done here,/ he promised.

Prowl narrowed his optics suspiciously. /What _are_ you doing there?/

/Oh, y'know, jus' gettin' some input from my peeps,/ he explained offhandedly.

Prowl blinked, taken aback. /You told them?/

/Jus' th'ones I trust,/ Jazz defended. /They wanna help, next time ya talk t'Ricochet,/ he added.

/I see,/ Prowl managed to get out, stunned by this turn of events. /Please let Ratchet know when you want to leave in the future./

Jazz clicked and the comm ended. Prowl frowned for a moment before shaking himself and turning back to rejoin the simulation.

This might have some interesting consequences.


	6. Making Allies

AN: Hey guys, sup? Sorry for the wait, of course... but... don't expect the updates to be any quicker. : / I am so sorry.

* * *

Prowl stepped into his office the next morning, reading through the offcycle notifications. There were only a handful, typical for a quiet shift. He made it halfway to his desk before his doorwings twitched and he froze. He glanced at the desk for a moment, the sensitive appendages swiveling and angling to pick up the various information the room was giving him. Then he relaxed and continued on his way, the ghost of a smirk crossing his face. He sat, logged into his untouched mainframe computer, and began his daily routine.

Once he was ready, he signaled Smokescreen and the other Praxian entered the office so they could discuss the events of the offcycle and what they had planned for the day. Smokescreen left and Prowl carried on with the paperwork he needed to complete. After an entire joor and a half of almost perfect silence in the room, Prowl spoke.

"I take it your somewhat rash decision to inform your subordinates has caught up to you," he commented mildly. There was a faint keen from underneath the desk, but that was all. Prowl couldn't help but smirk. "For what it is worth, if you trusted them enough to tell them, even if you didn't give yourself time to think about it, I believe they can be trusted." A frown replaced the smirk. "However, if you're in the business of telling people, you _have_ to tell Bluestreak, Jazz," he said softly. "He's worried, he misses you, and he knows this all started from that mission. He feels responsible, and it is wearing on him. He's asked me more than once what is going on and I have informed him that you will tell him when you're ready. But you should make that soon."

There was no answer, no sound or movement from under his desk. He returned his full attention to his work.

At midmorning his door slid open and Red Alert burst in. Prowl looked up, his doorwings flaring in annoyance.

"That is _it,_ Prowl!" the security director announced, stomping forward as the door closed behind him. "I have had it with this sneaking around and dodged questions and half answers! I want to know what the _pit_ is going on with Jazz and I want to know NOW."

The mech sat down in the guest chair forcefully, glaring across the desk at the tactician. Prowl lifted an optic ridge. "Jazz's condition is medical and classified. You will be informed when it becomes pertinent for you to know."

Red Alert glared harder, a faint hissing rising from him. "He is _dangerous_ and it is my _job_ to safeguard the Autobots from _all_ dangers, and _you will tell me what is going on_."

Prowl's bland expression didn't change. "Jazz's condition is _medical_ and _classified,_ and I assure you we are doing everything in our power to minimize the risks to all involved. When your expertise is needed, you will be informed."

The security director started _vibrating_. "I will pull _rank_ on you, Prowl, do not _test_ me," he warned.

Prowl put his datapad down, folding his hands on his desk. His doorwings lifted slightly, his expression going stony. "My rank is not the one in question here. Jazz's condition is _medical and classified_. If you wish to know the details, feel free to threaten Ratchet for them. I am neither authorized nor inclined to share that information with you, Red Alert."

The security director glared. The executive officer stared back, unyielding. Unstoppable force. Immovable object.

Prowl's internal comm blipped. /Prowl, is Red Alert in your office?/ Inferno demanded.

/Yes./

/ _Primus_ , I am _so_ sorry, I'll be there in just a klik!/

The faintest hiss of a giggle came from underneath Prowl's desk. Red Alert shot a startled glance at it, and then jumped out of his seat. "IS HE _UNDER_ YOUR _DESK_?!" he shrieked.

"No," Prowl said firmly, nothing in his body language changing.

"YES HE IS, I JUST HEARD HIM LAUGH!" Red Alert said shrilly, pointing.

Another, louder, stifled giggle came from under the desk. Prowl twitched and there was a soft clang, followed by an equally quiet "ow."

"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about," the tactician told him.

Red Alert's helm horns sparked and he let out a grating screech—classic signs of a security director meltdown. He'd start frothing at the mouth in a moment if he didn't get calmed down. Fortunately, Inferno burst in right at that moment.

"Red! I told you not to do this!" the assistant security director exclaimed. He grabbed the incoherently furious Red Alert, who was gesticulating wildly, and shoved him out of the office. "I thought we agreed this wasn't a good idea, you can't just demand information that Prowl doesn't want to give you, do you _want_ to be on his bad side?"

Jazz exploded with laughter, shaking the desk a bit, as the door closed behind the two mechs. Prowl slid his chair to the side and the saboteur crawled out, but couldn't get to his feet. Prowl went back to work for a breem, waiting. Jazz finally calmed down, and once he'd gotten ahold of himself he staggered up and plopped down into the guest chair, grinning lopsidedly.

"Y'know, I really needed that."

Prowl smirked. "Then I'm glad, though knowing Red Alert, he will only get more aggressive until he has answers."

Jazz shrugged. "An' he'll have t'suck it up. He can't pull rank without two other officers t'back 'im, so we're safe for now."

Prowl nodded agreement, picking up his datapad to go back to work. "So, who did you tell?"

Jazz pursed his lips. "Mirage, BlackHawk, an' Springlock."

"All trustworthy and loyal. I approve." Prowl nodded. "What did they have to say?"

Jazz slumped in his seat. "Uh, like, three _million_ questions, first off, but after that mostly jus' things we already figured out. 'Raj thinks it'll be helpful t'have 'im interact with different people, though, in case there's somethin' weird 'bout how he reacts t'you." The minibot shrugged.

"I concur, if you are comfortable having other mecha interact with Ricochet at this point?" Prowl lifted an optic ridge at him.

"Yeah, they'll be fine," Jazz agreed.

"Of course they will," Prowl muttered, rolling his optics.

Jazz snickered, grinning at his best friend. "I seen what Ricochet can dish out. 'S long as my mecha are as ready t'fight back as you were, they'll be fine."

The tactician hummed and glanced at him significantly. "Bluestreak."

"Nooooo," Jazz moaned, sliding right out of his seat and onto the floor.

"Why not?"

"'Cause… 'Cause it's _Bluestreak_ , tha's why!" Jazz whined.

"I fail to understand your reasoning. He will not think less of you, I can almost guarantee it."

"'Cause…he's… I don'…I can't…"

Prowl leaned over the desk to look at the saboteur on the floor. "Stop. Think about what you're trying to say. Formulate a sentence. _Then_ say it." He ordered.

Jazz fell silent for a long breem, and Prowl went back to work.

"I don' want him t'think…tha' I can't protect him," Jazz whispered. "I told 'im he would be safe with me, an' I don' want him t'think there's somethin' _wrong_ with me tha' makes that a lie." He curled up a bit. "Even if it is," he whispered.

"It isn't," Prowl countered softly. "If Bluestreak's account is accurate, Ricochet was less aggressive toward him than he has been to me two out of three times I have interacted with him. I'm pretty sure you're hurting him more by pushing him away than by telling him the truth."

Jazz fell silent again. "Mech, how come everythin' sounds so simple an' straightforward when you say it?"

Prowl smirked. "Because I am a tactician and it is my job to make things make sense. I'll come with you to tell him if you want."

Jazz sighed. "Yeah, that'd help, thanks."

Several breems passed in silence while Prowl worked and Jazz stared at the ceiling from the floor.

"Don't you have work to do?" Prowl wondered. There was movement near the ceiling that made his doorwings twitch. He glanced back sharply, but there was nothing there. Another flash of movement on the other side of his desk drew his gaze back to Jazz… who was not there anymore.

Prowl sighed deeply, shaking his helm. "Sometimes I regret helping you learn how to do that," he said.

A quiet snicker echoed out of the vents, and Prowl continued his work in silence.

~0~

That evening, Bluestreak was in his room, reading an old comic on his datapad. It was his favorite comic. He liked to reread it when he was upset, finding the familiar story comforting. He was almost to his favorite part when Jazz kicked his door in.

"ALRIGHT BABY BLUE HOLD ONTA YER CHEVRON, IMMA TELL YA A STORY!" the saboteur hollered.

Bluestreak jumped straight up, datapad flying across the room, and when he landed he was clutching his rife, optics wide. Jazz bounced in, grinning manically, and plopped himself down on the berth next to the young mech.

"That was _exceptionally_ rude," Prowl scolded the minibot from the door.

"I almost _shot_ you!" Bluestreak exclaimed, subspacing his rifle and sitting up. "Could you knock next time? Please?"

Jazz was still grinning like a nutcase, his visor bright. "Sorry, I'll do that." He handed the thrown datapad back to him and Bluestreak took it, putting it in his subspace.

"May I come in, Bluestreak?" Prowl asked politely, still standing in the hallway.

"Of course, Prowl," Bluestreak said, with a smile that wasn't quite enthusiastic enough for the chipper Autobot.

Prowl took a seat in the desk chair, the door sliding shut behind him with a quiet grinding. Jazz rubbed his hands together gleefully.

"A'right, kiddo, you ready fer one crazy story?" he asked.

Bluestreak eyed him. "I… guess?" he said, drawing his knees up to sit cross-legged.

"This's a story 'bout a mech called… what're we gonna call 'im?" Jazz asked Prowl.

"Rude," Prowl deadpanned.

"Tha's a terrible name, try again," Jazz said.

"Then troubled."

Jazz nodded. "Troubled's a good name. A story 'bout a mech called Troubled. Now, Troubled grew up on tha streets a one'a th'most gang-ridden cities on Cybertron, back in th'day, an' like most mecha on th'streets in tha' town, ended up joinin' a gang. Troubled did a lotta bad things in th'gangs, like a lot, just like ev'rybody else there with 'im—butcha see, Troubled wasn' like th'other gangsters. No," Jazz shook his head, frowning with an exaggeratedly solemn face, "y'see, Troubled had somethin' wrong 'im, with 'is processor. Made 'im somethin' o'a wild card, unpredictable inna bad way, an' really hard t'like. Ya'd be talkin' with 'im one moment, an' th'next he'd be stabbin' ya t'death." Jazz shrugged. "Like I said, messed up. But th'real trouble with Troubled, was he knew he was messed up."

Bluestreak was listening intently, frowning. "That sounds awful for him," he commented.

Jazz nodded, and his solemnity was real instead of exaggerated. "It was. He _hated_ it. An' the _real_ real trouble with Troubled, was he didn' know _what_ was wrong with 'im, an' that messed 'im up almost as much as 'is messed up processor did. But then," Jazz grinned again, a sparkle coming back to his visor. "Then Troubled met Mr. Officer!" Prowl rolled his optics. "An' Troubled was in a pretty bad place when he met Mr. Officer, like mentally an' all, but Mr. Officer was like…" Jazz cocked his helm. "Well, he was like Primus himself had risen from th'depths o'Cybertron t'knock some sense inta Troubled."

Prowl blinked, his doorwings flicking, but otherwise he didn't react.

"An' it worked!" Jazz announced with a wild gesture. "Mr. Officer knew stuff 'bout Troubled's condition an' how t'handle it, an' t'gether they got Troubled outta th'gangs an' inta somethin' tha' resembled a normal life. I guess. Fer a while. But… then things started gettin'… dangerous again. There was a war. An' Troubled had ta do stuff… a lot like what he'd had t'do in th'gangs, 'cause people needed 'im to. An' that was really bad fer Troubled, 'cause Troubled had a breaking point that nobody—not Troubled, or Mr. Officer, or anybody else—knew about. Th'gangs never could push 'im t'that breaking point, but the war… the war could, an' it did." Jazz fell silent, staring down at the floor for a long moment. Prowl could see how much Bluestreak wanted to say something, or ask a question, but the mech restrained himself, waiting. Jazz finally looked up, meeting the young Praxian's gaze. "That's what you saw, baby Blue. Tha's what happened t'me last vorn. 'M sorry I didn' tell ya all this time, but I didn'… I didn' wantcha t'think I couldn' take care o'ya. Ya had enough problems t'deal with, without worryin' 'bout mine," he said softly.

Bluestreak didn't say anything for a long moment, though he kept opening his mouth like he was going to. Jazz was staring at the floor again, waiting like a mech condemned.

"You've been this way… all this time?" Bluestreak finally asked, his voice a bit shaky.

"I been borderline personality disorder as long as I c'n remember," Jazz admitted. "Only been split since last vorn though."

Bluestreak's doorwings trembled while he did another fish impression, either completely lost for words or with too many words to decide what to say. Jazz was still staring at the floor, sinking lower every second there was silence in the room. It was heavy to him. So heavy. Prowl just waited, trusting them to work it out.

"You should have… you should have told me," Bluestreak finally choked out, a keen rising from his engine. He reached out, his vents ramping up and down trying to control his internal temperature. Jazz looked pained, but lifted an arm with only a scant instant of hesitation so Bluestreak could hug him. Bluestreak scooted closer, trying to stifle his keens, and rested his helm on Jazz's shoulder.

"I could have… helped you, or, something…" the young mech said over his quiet cries, his voice wobbling.

"Ya did help," Jazz said softly, rubbing the mech's dorsal plating comfortingly. "Jus' by bein' yourself, ya helped plenty, baby Blue. Ya gave me somethin' t'look forward to, someone t'be better for."

"But I could have _helped_ … I didn't _know_ …" Bluestreak whined, getting control of himself a bit. "I'm sorry."

"Ain't got nothin' t'be sorry for." Jazz said firmly. "I'm th'one that didn' tell ya, even though ya deserved t'know. I'm sorry, Bluestreak."

Bluestreak's vents cycled, clearing the last of the overwhelming emotions from his systems, though he didn't pull away from Jazz. "I accept your apology," the young mech murmured. Then he frowned, his doorwings drooping. "Did you split because of me?" he asked in a small voice.

Jazz didn't answer for a long moment, glancing at Prowl for guidance.

/The truth./ Prowl commed, lifting an optic ridge.

Jazz sighed. "I split 'cause you were gettin' tortured, but that ain't your fault. 'S my fault for bringin' ya. Don' blame y'self for this, alright? Blame ain't gonna control Ricochet." He muttered the last part, almost to himself.

Bluestreak sat up, pulling away. "Ricochet?"

Jazz winced. "That's 'is name, or that's what he tells us."

Bluestreak cocked his helm, doorwings fluttering in confusion. "He has a name?"

The saboteur smirked a bit. "Lemme explain."

~0~

Much later, Jazz followed Prowl to his room and threw himself on the Praxian's berth while Prowl pulled some datapads out of subspace and set them on his desk. He glanced over as he organized them with what was already there.

"You did very well, Jazz," he said.

Jazz just groaned, staying face down on the berth dramatically. Prowl rolled his optics and sat down in the desk chair. He worked for a few breems while Jazz recovered from the stress, but then remembered something and frowned. After a moment of thought, he turned to Jazz.

"Jazz… when you described our first meeting to Bluestreak…" he began hesitantly. Jazz turned his helm, pillowing it in his arms. "You said it was like Primus had confronted you. You were embellishing, weren't you?"

Jazz cocked an optic ridge behind his visor, the tilt of his mouth translating it beyond the translucent material. "Mm.. not really," he admitted.

Prowl just stared at him, his consternation subtle but still visible.

Jazz chuckled, sitting up. "Guess it didn' feel that way to you, huh." He met Prowl's gaze solemnly. "Never got around t'askin' ya, but… why _didn't_ ya shoot me that night?"

Prowl cycled a vent out, glancing down. "A couple decaorns before we met," he started quietly. "I responded to a call regarding an armed femme on a busy street threatening to shoot herself. I tried to talk her down… and I believe I could have, if I'd had more time, but another patrol responded, she startled and appeared threatening to the officers…" he trailed off, and then shrugged his doorwings, looking back at Jazz. "I saw the same thing in her that I saw in you that night. I didn't want it to end the same way."

Jazz nodded, and then smiled. "Don' think I ever said thanks for that, so… thank you, Prowl. Anybody else woulda killed me."

Prowl smiled back. "You're welcome, Jazz."

* * *

AN: In case it wasnt clear, each department commander can pull rank on other department commanders who outrank them when something happens involving their department (like Jazz being a threat to their security). However, the officer has to get two other officers to back them up, and then their combined authority overrides the other officer. Three officers working together could insist Optimus Prime himself cooperates with something they want him to do. What are the odds of that happening, tho?

This stipulation applies to the CMO as well. Does Ratchet care?

No.

Does that stop Ratchet from pulling rank on anybody and everybody?

No.

Does anybody call Ratchet out on his misuse of power and slighting of protocol?

 _Not if they want to live, they dont._


End file.
